


Lavender blue, a Gryffindor true

by Crollalanza



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-04
Updated: 2014-01-07
Packaged: 2017-12-10 09:16:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 45,631
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/784386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crollalanza/pseuds/Crollalanza
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Lavender Brown returns to Hogwarts for her seventh year, she knows things will be hard. Professor Dumbledore’s death has scared everybody, and with her Muggle-born mother in hiding, she makes a promise to her father to stay safe. </p><p>But to stay safe she must ignore her instincts and turn her back on her friends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Promises to Keep

**Author's Note:**

> I am not JK Rowling. 
> 
> If you have started reading my story High, then you might enjoy this.

_Lavender's green, dilly, dilly, Lavender's blue,  
If you love me, dilly, dilly, I will love you.   
Let the birds sing, dilly, dilly, And the lambs play;  
We shall be safe, dilly, dilly, Out of harm's way._

  
  
_Even the barrier feels different this year,_  thought Lavender Brown as she pushed her trolley through and onto platform nine-and-three-quarters. _But then I know that everything will change, so why am I surprised?_ Lavender did not feel the usual surge of excitement that she’d felt on previous years. It wasn’t just the pressure of the exam year, or the loss of her boyfriend, Ron that depressed her. It was the Hogwarts letter she’d received. As always, it had been signed by her Head of House, Professor McGonagall. As always, it had listed the subjects she was taking and the books she would need to continue her studies. But there were important differences. This year she was required to take Muggle Studies, which she’d dropped after her O.W.L. year and the book she’d had to buy had been disturbing.   
  
 _Muggles – Their Lies and Stupidity_ , by Silas Rosier, was a book like nothing she’d had to buy before for her schoolwork. It was a disturbing and vile book, and Lavender, who had known some Muggle children when she was growing up, had felt sick on reading the hate-filled pages.   
  
Huddled in a corner, by one of the pillars, she could see a girl with red hair. She looked round to expecting to see Ron was but she couldn’t locate him. She also couldn’t see Harry or Hermione, but wasn’t surprised at that. Harry, she knew, would be in hiding. As _Undesirable Number One_ , he wouldn’t be stupid enough to return to Hogwarts. Headmaster Snape would turn him over to You-Know-Who straight away, probably only pausing long enough to indulge in a spot of torture himself.   
  
Her thoughts turned to Hermione. She disliked her, true enough, because she was sure it was the other girl’s fault that she and Ron had ended so abruptly, but Lavender had shuddered when she’d heard that Muggle-borns were being rounded up and deprived of their wands. She hoped Hermione was safe. Lavender’s own mother, Heather Brown, was a Muggle-born but, luckily, they’d all been on a family holiday abroad when the news of the new registration had reached them. Her father, Thaddeus, had returned with Lavender and told the Ministry officials that his wife had run off with a ‘filthy Muggle’ and that he had ‘no bloody idea where his whore of a wife was!’ His perfectly executed lie had convinced Dolores Umbridge, and she’d dismissed him from her office, merely telling him that he’d been foolish to choose such a wife in the first place.   
  
Thaddeus had grimaced when they’d left and then enveloped Lavender in a hug. “I don’t know if they believed me, my darling, but for your mother’s sake we cannot contact her. So please don’t think about sending her an owl.” He’d paused and then gripping her firmly by the shoulders, he’d looked into her eyes. “Lavender, you must stay safe this year. I know the Carrows; I was at school with them. They’re stupid but very dangerous. I cannot bear to lose you, too. Promise me, darling. Promise me you’ll keep your head down and keep out of trouble.”  
  
Lavender had nodded mutely.  
  
“Lavender,” called a voice she recognised. Lavender turned round to see her best friends Parvati and Padma Patil walking towards her. They were both wearing identical faint smiles. She returned the smile and raised her hand in greeting. Parvati came close and hugged her tight. “How’s your mum?” she whispered.  
  
“I don’t know,” Lavender whispered back. She looked over her shoulder. “Is Ron here?” she asked, more to change the subject than anything. She knew she wouldn’t get him back.  
  
“He has Spattergroit, according to Ginny,” replied Padma, a faint note of disbelief in her voice. “It’s odd, really, given that Harry and Hermione are missing too, but the Ministry have checked up and he’s suffering badly.”  
  
Lavender looked across at Ginny who had now been joined by Neville Longbottom and Luna Lovegood. The three of them were huddled together talking conspiratorially. Neville raised a hand to her when he saw her watching.  
  
 _Promise me, darling. Promise me you’ll keep your head down and keep out of trouble._  
  
“Yes, Dad,” she murmured to herself and did not return Neville’s wave.  
  
A sudden crash through the barrier jerked Lavender back to the present. Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle had arrived. In stark contrast to the other students, they were laughing and joking.  
  
“No Malfoy, yet” murmured Parvati. “I thought he’d be here, flashing his Head Boy’s badge at us.  
  
“Godric! Is he Head Boy?” Lavender asked in horror.  
  
Parvati leant in close. “I don’t know, but I can’t think who else Snape would choose. After all he’s close to the Malfoys and if the rumours are true about Draco being a Death Eater, I can’t see why he’d pick anyone else.”  
  
“Pansy Parkinson is Head Girl,” added Padma. “She was talking about it in a very loud voice on the platform, earlier.”  
  
“Merlin, Malfoy and Parkinson as Head Boy and Girl, that’s worse than I thought,” exclaimed Lavender, slightly too loudly.  
  
“It’s a good job neither of them heard you say that, Brown,” said a boy behind them. The three girls turned to see Blaise Zabini watching them. Lavender was surprised he was there and that he’d deigned to talk to them. Blaise was someone who always kept himself apart from students in the other houses. “Pansy would certainly dock you House Points. Malfoy, however, doesn’t have that power.”  
  
“What do you mean?” asked Lavender curiously.   
  
Blaise smiled slightly and casually flipped his jacket open. “I’m Head Boy. Snape obviously decided Malfoy wasn’t up to the job.” Seeing Pansy waving at him, Blaise walked away.   
  
“Merlin!” Parvati exclaimed. “That’s a shock. I wonder why Snape chose Zabini.”  
  
“I have no idea, but I seriously doubt we’re any better off. Zabini doesn’t exactly like Gryffindor either... or Ravenclaw,” she added, remembering Padma was there. “Come on, let’s get on the train and find a carriage.”  
  
The three girls clambered onto the train. Lavender stumbled as she tried to load her trunk and a hand reached out to steady her. Lavender was about to say thank you, but then she looked at her saviour. It was Vincent Crabbe. He looked different. Not just taller, most of them had grown over the holidays, but he looked more confident.   
  
“You should thank people when they help you, Lavender,” he said in his strange little-boy’s voice. Lavender noticed his pudgy hand was still grasping her arm and had cupped her elbow. She moved away from him. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Seamus and Neville striding purposefully towards her.  
  
 _Promise me, darling. Promise me you’ll keep your head down and keep out of trouble._  
  
“Thank you,” she muttered and hurried onto the train.  
  


***

  
  
When Lavender looked back over the first few weeks at Hogwarts, she wondered how anyone had managed to smile, let alone laugh. They were dark days; Snape and the Carrows made sure of that. The tone had been set by the restrictions placed on the Sorting Hat at the Feast. It had not been allowed to sing but had merely been used to Sort the new first years. She had wondered at these new children; the majority of them had been scared of their surroundings, and she’d noticed none of the excitement that she’d felt when she’d been the first Gryffindor to be Sorted in her year.  
  
But in the common room that night, Seamus had begun cracking jokes in an effort to lighten the mood and she’d found herself joining in. Parvati had looked scandalised at first but soon began to laugh along with her friends. It was ten o’clock when Lavender noticed that the younger students had all gone to bed, and it was now only her, Parvati, Seamus, Neville, and Ginny who remained awake.  
  
Ginny withdrew her wand. _“Muffliato!”_  she muttered and then turned to address them all.  
  
“You know by now that Harry isn’t here, that his presence here could only mean his death. Ron and Hermione aren’t returning either. So,” she paused, “it’s up to us to carry on.”  
  
“Carry on what?” asked Parvati in puzzlement.  
  
“Dumbledore’s Army, of course,” replied Neville confidently. “We’re in a unique position, Parvati. We’re inside the school, we know the set up, and Dumbledore’s Army involves all three Houses.”  
  
“I’m in,” said Seamus immediately, “you know that, Neville.”  
  
Parvati nodded but slightly hesitantly, and then all eyes turned to Lavender.  
  
 _Promise me, darling..._  
  
“I can’t,” she muttered. There was a gasp from Seamus who’d been sitting nearest to her. He opened his mouth to speak.  
  
“What do you mean, you can’t?” interrupted Ginny. “Lavender, this is important. Harry, Ron, and Hermione are Godric knows where, and we need to fight.”  
  
“Why isn’t Ron at home? I thought he had Spattergroit,” said Lavender.   
  
Ginny looked around her carefully. “He’s on the run with the others. They’re doing something. I don’t know what, so don’t ask. But it’s something important. Look, I shouldn’t have told you any of that, especially if you’re not part of our movement, so I swear to you, Lavender Brown, that if you breathe a word of this conversation to anyone outside this room, I’ll hex you into the middle of next week. If the Ministry find out that Ron’s not at the Burrow, then my family will suffer!”  
  
Ginny held her wand up to Lavender’s face, in warning. Instantly, Lavender withdrew hers and brandished it.  
  
“You’re prepared to fight me, then, but not Snape?” hissed Ginny scornfully.  
  
“Ginny, leave it!” ordered Neville.   
  
Both girls looked at Neville in surprise. He sounded authoritative, a far cry from the scared little boy from previous years.   
  
“We don’t fight each other, okay,” he said in a more moderate tone. “Lavender, you were part of the original DA, and I want you with us... ”  
  
“You’re not the only one worried about your family,” retorted Lavender, looking straight at Ginny. “My mum’s a Muggle-born; she’s in  _real_ danger, Ginny. The kind a pure-blood like you, and you,” she said, gesturing to Neville, “can’t understand.  
  
“I promised my dad I’d stay out of trouble. He knows the Carrows, Neville. They may look clumsy and stupid, but they’re dangerous.” She got up from the sofa. “I’m sorry, I can’t help. Are you coming?” she said to Parvati, but Parvati shook her head.  
  


***

  
  
At the beginning of November, the Carrows' punishment regime kicked in. Neville, Ginny, and Luna Lovegood, the leaders of a small but growing band of rebels, were continually in detention for ‘acts of sedition.’ Neville frequently argued with Alecto Carrow in Muggle Studies and received stinging jinxes on many occasions. Seamus would offer equally frank opinions on Amycus Carrow’s technique in Dark Arts and had several times been hauled up before the Headmaster. Even Parvati had been known to challenge the regime. One morning at breakfast, Lavender watched in horror as her best friend was subjected to a humiliating hex that left her hands covered in painful boils.   
  
 _Oh, Godric, Dad! Why did you make me promise?_  
  
And although she helped her friend as much as she could over the next few days, she noticed Parvati becoming more distant.  
  
“I do understand your position, Lavender, really I do. But this is about more than your mum, and she’s safe, isn’t she?” Parvati said one night as they lay in their dorm.   
  
Lavender didn’t reply. She could feel tears sliding down her cheeks, wetting her pillow, but wasn’t sure whether she was crying for her mum, her friend, or herself.  
  
 _Merlin, Lavender. What’s happened to that that little girl who was so proud to be a Gryffindor?_  
  
The next morning the two girls were walking to Muggle Studies when three figures appeared in front of them.  
  
“Brown, Patil,” drawled Draco Malfoy. “You’d better hurry, or you’ll miss the start of the lesson. Professor Carrow is anxious you don’t miss this one, Brown.”  
  
“Why’s she bothered about me?” asked Lavender boldly.  
  
“It’s about Mudbloods,” replied Crabbe thickly.  
  
“It speaks,” blurted out Parvati mockingly to Draco. “Your trained ape speaks, Malfoy. Well, well, what a surprise!”  
  
Crabbe glared at Parvati and grabbed her by the hair.  
  
“Leave her, alone!” Lavender entreated. She looked directly at Crabbe. “Please, Cra...” _Merlin! What was his first name?_ Then she remembered. “Vincent.”  
  
Crabbe unfurled his fist from Parvati’s hair and stared at Lavender. Hurriedly, Parvati pulled Lavender away down the corridor. Crabbe watched her all the way.  
  
“He gives me the creeps, that one,” she whispered to Lavender. “There’s something different about him this year.”  
  
“I thought that,” replied Lavender, remembering the first day of term. “He and Goyle were always just Malfoy’s muscle but ... oh, I don’t know, there was something odd that first day. He helped me for one thing and... ” her eyes opened wide, “he knew my name. I mean he called me Lavender, not Brown.”  
  
“Why wouldn’t he know your name, Lavender?” said a haughty voice just ahead of them.   
  
Both girls stopped abruptly before they ran into Blaise, who was standing in the doorway of the Muggle Studies classroom.  
  
“Everyone knows Lavender Brown after your rather _public_  love affair with Weasley,” he said nastily. “You have a reputation.”  
  
“Get lost, Zabini,” flared Lavender. “I went out with one guy last year that hardly makes me the Hogwarts broom. It’s not as though I’ve worked my way through seven husbands, is it?”  
  
Blaise looked at her angrily, and she knew she’d gone too far. “Twenty points from Gryffindor, Brown,” he snarled. “I should put you in detention but... ”  
  
“No buts, Blaise,” sneered Alecto Carrow as she entered the classroom; clearly, she had heard every word. “Brown is not showing you due respect. She will serve detention tonight.”  
  


***

  
  
  
“Lavender Brown’s got a detention?” Ginny said in disbelief. She was sitting in an old armchair in the Gryffindor common room attempting to correct a Charms essay. “What did she do? Not crawl convincingly enough to dearest Alecto?”  
  
“Leave it, Ginny,” muttered Neville. “I told you before; we can’t start fighting amongst ourselves.”  
  
“She isn’t part of us, Neville. She made that clear the first night we got back.” Angrily, Ginny threw her quill across the room. “I know she’s always been more concerned about her nails than real life, but I did think she’d change this year.”  
  
“Why should I change when you have such a high opinion of me?” Lavender’s voice rang out from the stairs leading down into the common room. She walked to the doorway, wand in hand and a determined look on her face. Ginny looked away, but Neville got up and held the portrait door open for her.  
  
“Good luck,” he said. He noticed that Lavender was twirling her wand nervously. “It might not be too bad. It was only a mild insult to Zabini after all. I don’t think he’s a particular favourite of Alecto’s despite being a Slytherin.”  
  
“Thanks,” muttered Lavender as he gave her arm a squeeze. She smiled. “Perhaps I’ll get a trip to the Forbidden Forest like you two and Luna?”  
  
Neville frowned slightly. “I don’t know if you’ll be that lucky. I still haven’t worked out how we got away with such an easy detention, especially from Snape.”  
  
“Because Snape is a coward, of course,” stated Ginny. “He obviously thinks the Forbidden Forest is the scariest place in the world, and we’d be so cowed by our time there that we’d knuckle under like good little students.” She spat the last words out in disgust and looked directly at Lavender.  
  
“It’s funny, isn’t it?” flared Lavender suddenly, “how the three of you managed to get such a soft punishment, when Seamus and Parvati suffered far, far worse for much milder crimes. Why do you think that is, Ginny?”  
  
“What are you getting at?” demanded Ginny, narrowing her eyes.  
  
“Blood status,” replied Lavender harshly. “You three are pure-bloods, aren’t you? Snape respects that!”  
  
“Blood  _traitors,_ ” retorted Ginny dangerously. “I doubt we’ll be exchanging pleasantries soon.”  
  
“They want you alive, though, don’t they? A nice pure-blood community where Mudbloods don’t exist and half-bloods like me, Parvati, and Seamus are made to feel worthless.” She turned her back on the angry girl and walked out of the room towards her detention.  
  


***

  
  
_“Crucio!”_  cackled Amycus Carrow as he turned his wand on Terry Boot. Terry writhed under the curse; Lavender shuddered imagining the pain when it came to her turn.  
  
“You,” instructed the Dark Arts teacher, pointing to the Slytherin students who were standing at the back of the classroom, “will practise your curses on these students.” He smiled evilly, and the Slytherins smiled back.   
  
“Where’s Malfoy?” muttered Lavender to Terry as she helped him up. “I thought he’d be the first in the queue to practise... and Zabini.”  
  
“Draco was here, but he got summoned by Snape,” Terry whispered back. “I don’t know about Zabini; he’s never participated when I’ve been here. I dunno, perhaps he doesn’t need the practise.”  
  
 _“Crucio!”_  shouted a girl from the back of the classroom. Lavender felt a hot sharp pain run through her. She gasped at the shock, and then it disappeared. _Not too bad,_  she thought. _I can cope with that._  
  
“Not good enough, Miss Bulstrode,” ordered Amycus. “She barely felt that. Mr Crabbe, you have a go.”  
  
Lavender turned her face to see the gloating face of Vincent Crabbe, staring at her. _“Crucio!”_  he yelled as he pointed his wand at her. Again, Lavender felt a sharp, intense pain wave through her, and then it disappeared. Forewarned this time, she carried on writhing on the floor even though the pain had subsided to a dull throb. She looked at Crabbe and was surprised to see a flicker of what looked like guilt flash across his face.  
  
“How was it?” asked Parvati sympathetically as she returned to the common room.   
  
Lavender shrugged. “Horrible, painful, nothing you haven’t been through. Millicent Bulstrode certainly managed to hone her technique on me by the end of detention. Crabbe was useless, but I think I fooled him into thinking I was really hurt so he stopped.”  
  
Parvati looked puzzled. “That’s odd, Crabbe was the one dishing it out to me; he certainly wasn’t useless last week.”  
  
Lavender yawned; she didn’t have the energy to debate Vincent Crabbe’s Cruciatus curse. “Do you think we’ll be allowed into Hogsmeade tomorrow?” she asked.  
  
“Not a chance,” replied Parvati. “The Carrows are only letting the Slytherins out this weekend. The rest of us have to stay behind.”  
  
“Ah, well,” sighed Lavender. “Hogwarts without the Slytherins is a good thing. We can relax for a bit.”  
  


***

  
  
“Hey, Lavender, where are you going in such an ‘urry?”   
  
Lavender turned round swiftly as she heard Crabbe’s voice. He had appeared quite suddenly behind her as she walked along the third floor corridor and was so close she had to step back.  
  
“Back to my common room, not that it’s anything to do with you,” she replied, a touch haughtily.  
  
“Don’t be like that. I thought you might want to know why I went easy on you last night in detention.”  
  
“That was you going easy, was it?” Lavender replied, adding a tone of scepticism to her voice. A small voice in her head was telling her to be careful around him.  
  
“Yeah, Lavender,” he murmured. “If I’d wanted to cause you pain then I could ‘ave.”  
  
Lavender shuddered at the normality of his tone. Crabbe could have been discussing the weather. He moved closer to her, and she backed away.   
  
“You should thank me for that,” he said insistently. His hand reached out, and she could feel his pudgy fingers stroking her cheek. She flinched and saw his face momentarily darken.  
  
“I-I thought you’d be in Hogsmeade,” she stuttered in an attempt to change the subject.  
  
He wasn’t diverted and continued to stroke her cheek. Lavender froze as he touched her hair. “Don’t you like that?”   
  
“N-not really,” she muttered. “Err... I have to get going. Homework and things.”  
  
Lavender tried to walk off, but Crabbe grabbed her arm. “How about a drink, Lavender? Just one drink, yeah?” He stopped speaking and produced two bottles of Butterbeer from a bag.   
  
“What, here in the corridor?” she scoffed. Her hand fumbled in her robes for her wand, but it clattered to the floor. Crabbe bent down, picked it up but did not hand it back.   
  
“Have a drink with me, and then you’ll get your wand back,” he urged. He walked her across to the statue of the one-eyed witch and pulled her behind it to sit with him.  
  
Lavender looked around her, but there was no one nearby who could help. “One drink then, Crabbe,” she said at last and accepted the Butterbeer. Intent on retrieving her wand, she didn’t register in time that the bottle top was loose - as if it had been opened before – and she took a sip. Instantly, she knew there was something wrong. The Butterbeer tasted odd, and her body felt numb. She saw Crabbe watching her with a smile on his face, and then his face leered in closer. One hand clasped her face whilst the other wound round her waist, and he was pulling her into him. She felt his warm, flabby lips on her mouth, but she could barely move. He shifted his weight so he was almost lying on top of her. Lavender tried to scream, but he placed his hand over her mouth.   
  
“No one can hear you, Lavender,” he whispered eerily in his little-boy voice. “I won’t ‘urt you. I just want a kiss. You’re very pretty.”  
  
She looked up at him, her eyes darting from side to side in terror. She bit into his hand, and he unclamped it from her mouth. She tried to scream but no sound came out of her mouth.  
  
 _The Butterbeer,_  she thought in horror. _How could I have been so stupid?_  
  
“That wasn’t nice,” whispered Crabbe. He forced his mouth onto hers again and began biting at her lips. She could see her wand lying on the ground and tried to reach it but it was too far, and Crabbe was too heavy for her to wrench herself away.  
  
“Please,” she croaked. “Please, Vincent, let me go.”  
  
Although the drug was beginning to wear off, he was far too strong for her. He ignored her pleas and she felt his hand force open her robe.  
  
 _Merlin, NO!_  she tried to scream, but it was hopeless.   
  
Suddenly Crabbe rolled off her. She sat up quickly, amazed that he’d stopped when she’d been his for the taking, and grabbed her wand. She looked down at Crabbe. His eyes were closed, and there was a red welt across his cheek.   
  
“Get out of here, now,” urged a boy’s voice. Lavender turned her head sharply and saw Blaise Zabini standing on the other side of the corridor.  
  
“W-what are you doing here?” Lavender stammered as she stared up at her unlikely rescuer.  
  
“Saving you it seems,” hissed Blaise. “Get out of here, quickly, before he wakes, or Amycus turns up.”  
  
Lavender stayed where she was. “Why did you help me, Zabini? I’m a Gryffindor and a half-blood; I thought you hated my kind.”  
  
“I know what people think of me,” Blaise replied tersely. He strode over to Crabbe who was starting to stir, and then he shot another look at Lavender. “How many times do you need telling, Brown? You  _must_  get out of here!”  
  
“I’m not leaving until you tell me why you saved me. Besides, you can be my witness,” she replied.  
  
“Witness? Witness to what exactly?” Blaise questioned.  
  
“He drugged me and then assaulted me. You saw that, Zabini.”  
  
“I saw a Gryffindor girl with a dubious reputation in a clinch with a Slytherin boy,” he said darkly. “And that’s what the Carrows will believe. They’ll say you seduced him so you could hex him.”  
  
“But the drink...” Lavender walked towards the bottle she’d been sipping but to her horror it was empty, having been knocked over in the struggle. “Why did you hex him if that’s what you believe?”   
  
“I didn’t say I believed it. I said that’s what it looked like and that’s the story the Carrows will believe. Now,  _please_ , for the fourth time of asking, Lavender Brown, will you go back to your common room?”  
  
She started to walk away, but, still shaky from the ordeal and the remnants of the drugged Butterbeer, she felt her legs begin to buckle. She leant against the wall of the corridor and felt herself slide onto the floor.  
  
“Merlin!” Blaise muttered. He started to walk towards her but halted when he heard the sound of Crabbe stirring. Blaise lifted his wand and whispered, “ _Confundo!_ ” Crabbe groaned but sank back down into a sleep. Blaise turned his attention back to Lavender.  
  
“Do you think you can walk now?”  
  
“I need a minute or so, that’s all,” she replied. She began to shake violently as she realised what had nearly happened. Blaise squatted down next to her. “I-I-I’m s-sorry. I haven’t said thank you – or anything.”  
  
“I wasn’t expecting it, to be honest,” he said in a gentle tone she never thought she’d hear from him.   
  
“Why not?” she asked.  
  
“You’re a Gryffindor, Lavender, and you hate Slytherins,” Blaise replied starkly.  
  
“That’s not true,” Lavender began, but then she stopped. It was true. It had always been true. In six years of school, she’d never thought Slytherins could be anything but bad. She sighed. “You may be right.”   
  
“It’s the way things are,” he stated. “You Gryffindors are so prejudiced.”  
  
“At least we don’t give a toss about blood status, unlike you,” Lavender retorted. She was starting to feel calmer now as though this sparring with Blaise was relaxing her.  
  
“Who told you that?” Blaise asked.  
  
“Oh, Pansy’s always talking in a very loud voice about how hard you are to please, Zabini,” she replied scornfully. “And Harry overheard you last year telling Malfoy you wouldn’t touch Ginny Weasley because she’s a ‘filthy blood-traitor.’”  
  
Blaise grimaced. “Of  _course_  I told Malfoy that. It wasn’t smart to disagree with him last year.” He glanced across at Crabbe who was still unconscious, and then he held out his hand to her. “You should be going before that thick lump wakes up.”  
  
Lavender accepted his hand as she stood up. “What are you going to do with him?”  
  
“Oh, modify his memory, I think. He’ll think it’s all been a dream by the time I’ve finished. Just make sure you warn the other girls, okay?”  
  
She smiled at him and started to walk up the corridor. Then she turned back. “You haven’t told me why you helped,” she said.  
  
Blaise smiled ruefully. “It’s complicated, Lavender, but let’s just say I knew you wouldn’t be with Vincent Crabbe willingly.”  
  
“But I’m a half-blood  _and_  a Gryffindor. Why are you putting yourself out for me?”  
  
Blaise walked over to her. For a moment she forgot about everything that had happened as she stared into his dark, almost black, eyes. “I’m not a pure-blood, either,” he murmured in her ear, and then he walked away back to Crabbe.  
  


***

  
  
She returned to Gryffindor Tower but did not linger in the common room with Parvati and Seamus. Instead, she ran up the stairs to her dormitory. Blaise’s revelation had distracted her from the assault, but now it came flooding back. She could still taste Crabbe’s vile spittle on her lips and feel his pudgy, damp hands on her body where he’d forced her robe open. She began to shake again. She wondered briefly why she wasn’t crying. Tears had come easily when she’d broken up with Ron, but now, as she stared at the blank wall where Hermione’s Arithmancy chart used to be, she was dry-eyed.   
  
Suddenly, she tore off her clothes and hurled them into the corner of the room. Wrapping herself in her bathrobe, she made her way to the bathroom. The water was hot, and she could feel her skin stinging under the shower spray. But it was a good pain; it was cleansing, and as she scrubbed at her skin with her rough flannel, a picture of her mother floated into her head.   
  
“Be strong, Lavender,” she’d whispered as she’d said goodbye.  
  
With a sudden lift to her heart, Lavender stepped out of the shower and began to dress herself in clean clothes. She smiled to herself as she walked down the stairs and back to the common room. In one corner sat Parvati and Seamus who had been joined by Ginny and Neville. They were whispering conspiratorially but stopped as she approached.   
  
“May I sit down?” she asked. Neville nodded, but Ginny scowled at her.   
  
“We’re talking, Lavender. D.A. stuff, so just leave, will you?”  
  
 _Promise me, darling. Promise me you’ll keep your head down and keep out of trouble._  
  
Lavender took a deep breath and looked at them all, one-by-one. She stared into Ginny’s eyes meeting her hostile gaze with one of frankness.   
  
 _Be strong, Lavender._  
  
“Tell me how I can help,” she said at last.


	2. He will Not See Me Stopping Here

_Send for your men, dilly dilly, set them to hoe,_  
Set them to reap, dilly dilly, set them to mow,  
Some to cut hay, dilly dilly, some to cut corn,  
While you and I, dilly dilly, keep ourselves warm.

  
  
They lost Luna Lovegood at Christmas. They knew it was only a matter of time because Xenophilius’ paper had been urging rebellion and several copies had made their way to Hogwarts despite the Snape’s purge on any reading material aside from  _The Daily Prophet._  
  
Lavender had been in the carriage when the Death Eater had pulled Luna off. Parvati had screamed and Ginny had hurled abuse, whilst Neville, who had walked to the station to see them off, had received a violent hex to his chest as he’d tried to pull them off, but Luna had looked quite calm. She’d turned her head and smiled serenely in that odd, dreamlike way of hers, and although they knew it that they would not see her again, Luna had somehow left them with a feeling of hope.  
  
“She’ll be okay. She’ll be okay,” Lavender had tried to reassure them. Her words chiming with the train wheels became a mantra on the journey home.   
  
But no one was surprised when Luna failed to return in the New Year.  
  


***

  
  
As the Carrows increased their disciplinary measures, Neville insisted on bigger plans for retaliation. There were no dissenters this term. Terry Boot rallied the rest of the Ravenclaws to the cause. In the past they’d belittled Luna, wondering how on earth she could be a Ravenclaw when she seemed to be so weird, but now that she was gone, they willingly listened to Neville and Ginny’s plans for further rebellion.   
  
“We need to keep at them,” Neville said one evening. Lavender, Parvati and Ginny had joined him and Seamus in their dormitory. It was odd seeing three empty beds and Lavender prayed fervently that the three boys were safe. She knew, from Seamus, that Dean had gone into hiding, but there was no news of Ron and Harry. Closing her eyes, she remembered one particular walk she’d taken with Ron by the lake. It had been just after Christmas and she’d questioned him continually about why he wasn’t wearing the necklace she’d given him. Ron had insisted that he’d lost it. He said his brother Fred had stolen it. Lavender knew he’d been lying but at the time she was just pleased he was back and that she had a boyfriend again.  _Merlin, you’re a fool, Lavender Brown. Ron wouldn’t have been seen dead in a necklace like that._ She couldn’t even remember why she’d bought it now.  _It had been a whim,_ she thought.  _A gift that no one else would get him -- especially not Hermione Granger._  Lavender gasped – she’d been jealous of Hermione even then.  
  
“Earth to Lavender!” Ginny’s voice roused her from her memory. “Do you realise you’ve been staring at my brother’s Quidditch poster all this while. Have you even heard a word of Neville’s plan?”  
  
Lavender smiled apologetically. “Sorry, Neville. You were saying something about the lower dungeons.”  
  
Neville cleared his throat and began speaking. “The lower dungeon isn’t normally in use, but Terry reported seeing the Carrows enter a room. They sent Slughorn away and then began to talk. Terry couldn’t hear the conversation – that reminds me Ginny, can you ask your brothers for more Extendable Ears? I’d like then to become standard issue for DA members.” Ginny nodded and he continued, “So, if the room is of interest to Amycus and Alecto it follows that it is also of interest to us.”  
  
“What do you think it’s to be used for?” asked Seamus breathlessly. His eyes widened. “Could it be a meeting room for the Death Eaters?”  
  
Ginny scoffed. “I doubt that, not while they have Malfoy Manor to go to.” She bit her lip. “This does tie in with some information Hannah discovered when she was in detention the other day.” Frowning in concentration, she continued, “Alecto mentioned ‘new measures’, that can’t be good.”  
  
“Perhaps they’re going to return it to its original use,” said Parvati bleakly. She glanced around at the puzzled faces. “I remember Binns saying something about Hogwarts in the Middle Ages. The dungeons weren’t always classrooms – they were cells.”  
  
Neville whistled slowly. “And knowing the Carrows, it won’t simply be a cell – more like a torture chamber. We need to get in there and see what they’re planning.” He got up off his bed and walked to the window. Lavender could see his brow furrowing as he thought. Even last year she would have laughed at the idea of taking orders from him, but now they all looked to him for answers.  
  
“Okay,” he said after a while. “I’ll go down there and have a look around. Ginny, I think I’ll need you to watch my back – you have quickest reactions of anyone.” He paused. “We’ll need a decoy for the Carrows and any Slytherin patrols.”   
  
Ginny pulled out a list from under her robe. “According to this, Zabini and Crabbe are on duty. Crabbe should be easy enough to distract – the thick lump – but Zabini might have to be hexed.”  
  
Lavender flinched at the mention of Crabbe and saw Parvati watching her with a curious look in her eye. She hadn’t mentioned the assault to anyone, not even her friend, because she felt ashamed that her stupidity had endangered her and she felt she couldn’t explain Blaise’s actions without giving him away. She owed him that much. But she had needed to warn the other girls about Crabbe in case he tried the same trick on someone else, so she’d told them she’d seen him looking up a Paralysing Potion in the library. She didn’t think Parvati had believed her then, and looking at her now, she knew she would be treated to another interrogation soon. She still shuddered when she thought of Crabbe’s vile breath and remembered his hands as they groped her. Then the image would fade and she’d be looking into Blaise’s velvet, almost purple, eyes and she’d feel safe.  
  
 _I’m not a pureblood, either,_  he’d said as she’d left. She had ruminated on his words but could find no satisfactory answer. His mother, Karis Flint, was on her eighth husband, and the wedding to a much younger man had made the centre pages of  _The Daily Prophet._ In the days of Rita Skeeter, there would have been some scurrilous comments about the deaths of her previous seven husbands, but the Flint family were well connected and Jonah Flint, although eleven years younger than his bride, belonged to a powerful family who clearly had influence. There had been a family tree detailing the bloodline of each family; all were pure. And the Zabini name was well known throughout the wizarding world. Chester Zabini, Blaise’s father, had been the last of a very old pure-blood line. He had been in his sixties when he’d married and had died before Blaise was three. So, perhaps, Chester Zabini was not Blaise’s real father.  
  
Lavender looked at Parvati who was still studying her. “I’ll cause the diversion,” she said hurriedly. “I could use that Peruvian darkness powder if we have any left.” She looked at Ginny but the other girl shook her head. “Okay, well I’ll think of something. It shouldn’t be too hard to fool Crabbe, and I can always stun Zabini.”  
  
They swung into action the next evening. As Ginny and Neville walked down the steps to the Dungeons, Lavender kept watch at the top. Sure enough, before she’d been there long she heard the heavy footsteps of Vincent Crabbe as he approached with Blaise. Her heart began to pound as if it were forcing its way out of her ribcage. This was the first time she’d been this close to either of them since the assault, and suddenly she knew she could not cope. She forgot about warning her friends. All she could think of, as she flattened herself against the stone wall, was Crabbe’s weight on her and how she hadn’t been able to scream.  _Oh, Merlin, what if he remembers?_  she thought in horror. She could feel her throat tightening, but although she wanted to run, she grasped her wand firmly and tried to take deep, calming breaths. The footsteps grew closer and now she could hear the sound of two boys laughing. Her head cleared – she was a lookout, a decoy and she had a job to do. Stepping out from the pillar, she deliberately collided backwards into them.  
  
“Brown! What the ...?” exclaimed Blaise. He frowned a little and lowered his voice. “You shouldn’t be here.”  
  
“Is it an offence to walk around the castle now, Zabini?” she said loudly, praying that Neville and Ginny had heard her.   
  
“You know it is, Lavender,” said Crabbe softly. Lavender shuddered involuntarily as he took a step closer. She could feel her palms sweating and, although she tightened her grip on her wand, it slipped from her hand. Crabbe put his foot on the handle as it clattered to the ground.   
  
A wave of nausea erupted in her stomach; Lavender could feel it searing the back of her throat. “Please,” she whispered, “give it back.”  
  
Crabbe bent down and picked up her wand. “What do you think, Blaise?”  
  
Lavender felt Blaise’s eyes on her before she turned to look at him. He reached his hand out and took the wand from Crabbe’s. “Vincent, why don’t you get back to the common room?” He smirked. “I’ll give Brown her wand back.”  
  
Crabbe laughed nastily but walked off, brushing against her as he walked down the stairs. Lavender watched as he lumbered away from them and then, as he turned right towards his common room and away from the Dungeons, she heaved a sigh of relief. She held out her hand for the wand but Blaise held it out of her reach.   
  
“Oh, no, Lavender, I want to know exactly what you’re doing down here. From your reaction to Crabbe just now, you’d rather be in the Forbidden Forest than anywhere near the Slytherin common room.”  
  
“It’s nothing,” she muttered. “Look, just give me the wand and I’ll go.”   
  
“I doubt that,” he scoffed. “Let me guess; you’re a lookout, I suppose.”  
  
Lavender felt her stomach clench and tried to keep her voice steady as she replied, “N-no, not at all. I-if you must know, I was looking for you. I wanted to talk to you about what happened last term.” It wasn’t quite a lie; she did want to speak to him and perhaps she could lead him away from Neville and Ginny.  
  
Blaise looked at her, disbelief all over his face, but he nodded. “Okay, Brown, if that’s the way you want to play it. Let’s find somewhere a bit more private for this ‘chat’.” She held out her hand for her wand. “Not yet. I wouldn’t put it past you to hex me as soon as I turned my back.”  
  
“I wouldn’t do that,” Lavender exclaimed in outrage. “Merlin, Blaise, you saved me from Crabbe last term. You must have a pretty poor opinion of me if you think I’d repay you with a curse.”  
  
Blaise raised one eyebrow quizzically but said nothing. Then, slowly, he held out her wand. Lavender took it gratefully and followed him down the stairs. They stopped outside Slughorn’s office, and Blaise tapped the lock with his wand and muttered something under his breath. The door creaked open. “Professor Slughorn’s security isn’t as good as Snape’s,” he said as he held the door open. Lavender walked in. She’d never been in Slughorn’s office and was amazed to see how comfortable it looked. Professor McGonagall’s office had a very definite air of austerity, whereas Slughorn obviously thought that work could only be accomplished when he was well supplied with mead and Turkish Delight. The fire in the hearth was dying but Blaise lit it again and pulled up a squashy looking sofa. He motioned to Lavender to join him and she sat on the other side, keeping her distance.  
  
“So, Lavender,” he said as he stretched out his long legs, “what do you want to talk about?”  
  
She swallowed and pulled her own legs closer to the sofa. “Er, that stuff you said about not being a pure-blood,” she spluttered. “Is it true?”  
  
Blaise leant forward and looked into the fire. “Yeah,” he replied softly. “It’s true.” He got up and prowled around the room. Stopping at the cabinet above the desk, he pulled out a bottle of Firewhisky and then, finding a couple of glasses, he poured two shots. “Sluggy won’t miss this, he never drinks it, just keeps it in case Amycus turns up. Go on,” he said as Lavender shook her head, “I haven’t spiked it.”  
  
Perhaps he realised his mistake because he put both glasses down and suddenly was by her side. “Shit, I’m sorry,” he muttered. “That was bloody tactless of me.”  
  
Horrified to find tears spilling out of her eyes, Lavender covered her face with her hands and tried, unsuccessfully, to hold back the sobs that suddenly threatened to tear her apart. Blaise sat very still and then carefully placed his arms around her and began to whisper, “Hush, Lavender, he won’t get to you again.”  
  
His words, repeated again and again, soothed her until she placed her hands in her lap and was able to speak. “I’m sorry,” she began, “I think I’m fine but then seeing Crabbe and you together just brought it all back and I ... Merlin, if you hadn’t been there... I couldn’t move, you know,” her voice lowered to barely a whisper, “and his hands were all over me, inside my robe and my shirt. And I tried to scream; I tried to push him off, but I had no wand and he was so  _heavy_  and... Oh, God! Oh God!” Her voice rose and she could feel her heart beginning to pound again.   
  
“It’s okay,” Blaise murmured as he stroked her hair.   
  
“But it’s not, is it?” Lavender said bitterly. “As you said, I’m a girl with a dubious reputation – no one would have believed me.”  
  
Slowly, Blaise placed a hand under her chin and looked deep into her eyes. “I would have believed you.”  
  
“Really?” she sniffed.   
  
“Yeah,” he said. He brought out a handkerchief from the pocket of his robe, but instead of offering it to her, he began to wipe her tears away himself. “Someone like you, Lavender, isn’t going to shag a fucking ape like Crabbe.”  
  
“Someone like me? What do you mean?” she asked curiously.  
  
“Stop fishing for compliments. You  _know_  you’re a pretty girl. And pretty girls don’t go out with ugly gits... although you did snog Weasley for a long time.”  
  
He laughed slightly and, despite everything, Lavender found herself smiling.  
  
“What was wrong with Ron?”   
  
“Nothing, I suppose, if you like red-haired twats who keep their brains in their Quidditch shorts.” He got up and, walking across to Slughorn’s desk, picked up the two glasses of Firewhisky. He sat back down and offered her a glass. “Come on, I think you need this.”   
  
She sipped gingerly but felt a warmth steal into her. “Thank you,” she said at last. “For this and ... for listening.”  
  
“Don’t you talk to your friends then?” he asked in surprise. “I mean, you did warn them, didn’t you?”  
  
“Yes, of course,” she replied sharply. “I didn’t go into details, though. I said I’d seen Crabbe in the library looking up potions that was all. Besides, you said you were going to modify his memory.”  
  
“Mmm, I did do that, all right, but he still seems to remember something – I don’t quite know what. You need to be careful around him,” warned Blaise.   
  
She shuddered. “I will, don’t worry.” She paused and then edged closer to Blaise. “Why are you helping me, Blaise? I don’t mean last term, I mean now, with Crabbe. You sent him away.”  
  
There was a long pause. Blaise sipped his drink and gazed into the fire. Lavender watched as the flame light seemed to dance on his face, illuminating the hawk-like visage. “My mother,” he said finally, “was already pregnant when she married Zabini. It wasn’t a secret – at least not between me and her. But last summer I found out who my real father is – or rather was.”  
  
“And?”  
  
“He was a Muggleborn called Josiah Tremlow. They met soon after she left Hogwarts and, according to her, they were  _madly in love._  He, however, forgot to tell her that he was already married. She fell pregnant and he offered to leave his wife, but that wasn’t what my mum wanted. Tremlow wasn’t wealthy and Zabini was.”  
  
“She told you all this?” Lavender was astounded to hear these intimate secrets coming from his lips.  
  
Blaise shook his head. “No, I found some letters Josiah had sent her. I think he loved her very much, but he wasn’t what she wanted from life at the time.” He chuckled slightly. “Did you see the pictures of her latest wedding?” Lavender nodded. “Now, this one, I think she really loves. It’s just a shame he’s such an arse.”  
  
Lavender giggled; the Firewhisky was making her feel lightheaded and she smiled widely at Blaise. “Is he like Marcus, your new step-daddy? Merlin, he was horrible.”  
  
Blaise snorted. “Fortunately, Jonah is slightly more civilised than Marcus, and he is the heir. I won’t be calling him Daddy, though.”   
  
“So, you’re a half-blood, is that the only reason you helped me?” persisted Lavender.  
  
Blaise smiled wryly. “Isn’t that enough?” He sighed. “Imagine you’ve been brought up to think only pure-bloods matter – even if at the back of your mind you feel uneasy – you go along with what people tell you.” Lavender nodded slowly so he continued, “You don’t really get on with the people in your year, but you associate with them because otherwise you’d have no one to talk to at all. And you go along with their crap because you don’t want to stand out. Then, one day, you discover that you’re not a pure-blood and your father was actually a ‘filthy Mudblood’.”  
  
“You said ‘was’ not ‘is’,” Lavender asked. “What happened to Josiah?”  
  
“He’s dead.” Blaise said abruptly. “Nothing sinister, he was a drunk-flyer who had a few too many and collided with a tree on his way back from the pub.”  
  
“Oh, er, how unfortunate,” replied Lavender, feeling that her response was less than adequate. “Thank you for telling me. It explains why you helped.”  
  
“Oh, Lavender, that wasn’t the only reason,” muttered Blaise. He moved closer to her, then reached out a hand and smoothed a lock of her hair behind her ear. Lavender felt her insides turn molten as he leant forward. She could feel his lips touch hers, tentatively at first, and then, as she responded, he increased the pressure. Cupping her face very gently in his hands, his tongue teased apart her lips until he was exploring the very intricacies of her mouth. He kissed her neck and she thought she was drowning. She lifted her hands and began to run them through his close cropped hair, resting them finally around his neck as she pulled him ever closer. She was lying back now on Slughorn’s squashy sofa; Blaise shifted his weight so he was lying by her side. All the while he was kissing her, bestowing soft pecks on her cheeks, her eyelids, her neck. His arm slid around her waist and she gave herself up, utterly, to the moment. This was not like her wrestling sessions with Ron – or her chaste kisses with Seamus. This was not a teenage snogging marathon where she’d emerge only for a quick gulp of air before getting back to business. Feeling Blaise move against her, she instinctively moulded her body around his. His hand slid below her blouse and pulled her ever closer. This felt so immediate, yet so right. It was pure, unadulterated heaven. She moaned softly as his mouth began to trail downwards from her neck, to her collarbone, to her...  
  
There was a noise outside of two people talking in low voices; Blaise jerked upwards. “What the hell?”  
  
Lavender froze.  _Shit, it’s Neville and Ginny!_  
  
Blaise looked at her horrified face. “You are the lookout, aren’t you?” he said bitterly. He wrenched himself out of her arms and looked at her with utter disdain. “Just how far were you planning to go, Brown? Would you have fucked me? Or did Longbottom tell you just to tease?”  
  
Lavender blanched. “Blaise, you’ve got it all wrong.” She clenched and unclenched her hands nervously. “I didn’t set out to...”  
  
“To seduce me?” he whispered menacingly. “Tell me, those tears from earlier and the questions – were they just a ploy to keep me away?”  
  
She took a deep breath and watched as Blaise picked up his drink and downed the rest of it in one gulp. “Please, Blaise, listen to me,” she began. She stood up and adjusted her clothing. “I did need to keep you talking – that’s true – but I didn’t plan any of this.”  
  
“Yeah, right.” Blaise rolled his eyes to the ceiling and slammed his glass on the table. It shattered cutting his hand. “Fucking hell!” he cursed as the blood dripped onto the floor. Lavender picked up the handkerchief on the sofa that he’d used earlier to dry her tears. Slowly, she approached him and then taking his hand, she wrapped it up. They both watched as the blood seeped through. There was a long pause.  
  
“You should go,” he said bleakly as he let go of her hand, “before Gryffindor launches a rescue mission.”  
  
Lavender walked to the door but paused when her fingers touched the door handle. She smiled sadly. “I know you’re angry, Blaise, but it was  _you_  that kissed me.”


	3. The Woods are Lovely, Dark and Deep

_If I die first, dilly dilly, and that may be,_

 

_You must live on, dilly dilly, thinking of me._

  
  
  
“So where  _did_  you get to last night?” demanded Parvati. “Don’t shrug, Lavender. You were the look-out and then you disappeared.”  
  
“I told you. I was hiding from Crabbe and Zabini,” replied Lavender firmly. She knew Parvati had been waiting to talk to her all day, and she’d successfully avoided being alone with her, but here in their dorm there was no escape.  
  
“Ginny said she heard you talking to them,” persisted Parvati.  
  
Lavender moved away from the mirror where she’d been brushing her hair and got into bed. “Yes, I was talking to them. I thought it was the best way to warn Ginny and Neville.”  
  
“And they let you go?” Parvati sat on the side of Lavender’s bed. “I don’t understand why you didn’t hex them.”  
  
Lavender sighed, but she’d prepared herself for this question. “I dropped my wand, okay.”  
  
“And Zabini just let you leave?”   
  
“Er ... yes,” Lavender said hesitantly.  
  
“But you didn’t come back here straight away.” Parvati’s interrogation was starting to pick holes in Lavender’s rather feeble story.  
  
She rallied. “No, of course not. I had to make sure Ginny and Neville were okay, so I hid and waited for them.”  
  
Parvati frowned and Lavender knew her best friend did not believe her. She had an urge to tell her everything: how Blaise had saved her from Crabbe’s assault and then how they’d talked. How his lips had felt when they’d kissed and his hands ... She shook her head. She was a Gryffindor and he was a Slytherin; Parvati would not understand.  
  
“I’m tired, Parvati. Please let it go. I need to sleep.”  
  
There were only two classes she shared with Blaise – Muggle Studies and Divination -- so Lavender was able to avoid him quite easily for the next few days. At mealtimes, she thought she saw him glance her way, but when she looked up, Blaise would be chatting to Pansy – laughing with her. Pansy and Blaise. Blaise and Pansy. They were together a lot, she noticed.  _Why am I bothered?_ she thought. _It meant nothing. It was just a kiss._ But then her mind would wander dangerously to that night and the thought of him sent her reeling with lust.  
  
Pansy ran her hand over Blaise’s arm and he lowered his head to hers as she whispered something.   
  
“That’s new,” muttered Ginny. She pointed towards them with her fork at breakfast. “Zabini and Parkinson. She must have given up on Malfoy.”  
  
“Oh, yes, I suppose so.” Lavender turned her head to where Draco was sitting with Crabbe and Goyle. “He’s changed, don’t you think? Not so sure of himself. It’s odd, really.”  
  
“What’s odd?” Neville asked as he joined them. He had a bruise over one eye where Amycus had hexed him the evening before for refusing to practise Unforgiveables on the Hufflepuff first years.   
  
“Lavender thinks Malfoy’s changed,” Ginny answered. “You could be right; he doesn’t swagger anymore. His Death Eater duties must be  _so_  arduous.”  
  
“I wonder if any of the others are Death Eaters?” pondered Neville.  
  
“Well,” Ginny replied, “Harry said that Crabbe and Goyle’s dads were, but I’m not sure You-know-Who would recruit total idiots.”  
  
Lavender shuddered. “They’re not as stupid as we thought, though, are they? Amycus spends a lot of time with them both. We’ve seen them in Dark Arts; it’s become their best subject.”  
  
“They’re still idiots,” Ginny scoffed.  
  
“What about Zabini?” Lavender looked at Parvati, who’d posed the question. She wondered if she was imagining Parvati’s eyes on her.  
  
“Hmm, let’s see,” Seamus said and he held up his hand, beginning to tick off reasons. “Head Boy, Snape’s pet, Sluggy’s favourite Potions pupil – according to Ernie – and the Carrows never seem to faze him. Death Eater to be sure.”  
  
“Plus Pansy is all over him,” agreed Ginny. She laughed. “I wondered why Daphne was looking so sour yesterday. He must have finished with her.”  
  
“What, Daphne Greengrass?” Neville sounded surprised. “When did that happen and how do you know all this stuff, Ginny?”  
  
“The usual – Hogwarts grapevine. Snape can stop a lot, but gossip in the girls’ toilets goes on.” She laughed again. “I overheard Daphne in the toilets sobbing because Zabini finished with her.”  
  
“I never minded Daphne,” mused Parvati as she nibbled her toast. “Oh, don’t look at me like that. I know – Slytherin enemy, but Daphne was never a bitch like Parkinson. She was quite funny in Charms club.” She sighed. “Shame we can’t trust her.”  
  
“Too good for Zabini then,” said Ginny dismissively. “He must only go for bitches.”  
  
Lavender felt nauseous. She pushed her plate to one side.  _Merlin, how far would I have gone? If we hadn’t overheard Neville ... Shit._ She closed her eyes because she knew that if they hadn’t been interrupted she’d have let Blaise do whatever he wanted.  
  
“Excuse me,” she said as she got up and ran out of the hall. She felt clammy, her head swimming and just made it to the toilets in time to heave up her breakfast.   
  
“Lavender,” she heard Parvati call, “are you all right?”  
  
“Fine,” she managed and then started spewing up bile. “Just go. I’ll be okay.”  
  
But when she opened the door of the cubical, she wasn’t surprised to see Parvati standing there. “I want to know what’s going on between you and Zabini,” Parvati demanded.  
  
Lavender knew there was no point in denying it this time. “I owe him,” she whispered as she sat down on the stone bathroom floor.  
  
Parvati lowered herself to the floor. “Go on,” she said grimly.  
  
Looking around to check that they were alone, Lavender began to tell her friend everything. When she got to Crabbe’s assault, her voice cracked slightly, but she did not stop. Parvati leant forwards and squeezed her arm; her dark eyes full of compassion. When Lavender got to the part where Blaise had saved her, she said nothing just listened intently.  
  
“So,” she said at last. “Are you going to tell me about the other night?”  
  
Lavender raised her face to the ceiling. “There really isn’t much to tell. I was the lookout, and I bumped, literally, into Crabbe. Zabini was with him.”  
  
“Did they try anything?”  
  
“NO!” exclaimed Lavender. “At least ... Crabbe doesn’t remember much and he left. Look, Parvati, you have to understand. I was the lookout so I had to get Blaise away, and after what he did for me, I wasn’t about to hex him.”  
  
“I do understand, but what  _did_  you do?”  
  
“I said I needed to talk to him and we ... err ... broke into Slughorn’s study.”  
  
“And?” Parvati’s questions were relentless.   
  
“We talked and then ... Oh gods ...” She trailed off as she thought of Blaise laughing with Pansy in the hall.   
  
“What happened? Did he touch you or something? Lavender, tell me!”  
  
“It wasn’t like that. He kissed me, okay. We were talking and I got upset about Crabbe again and he comforted me.”  
  
“And that’s it.” Parvati sounded unconvinced. “He ‘comforted’ you, and then you kissed.”  
  
“Yes, except ...”   
  
“What?”  
  
Lavender looked at the ground. “He overheard Neville and Ginny so realised I was the lookout. He thinks it was deliberate ... that I’m some kind of slut.”  
  
“What does that matter?” Parvati was scornful. “His opinion isn’t important. He’s a Slytherin, Head Boy, and the enemy.” She leant forwards and grasped Lavender’s shoulders. “For God’s sake, Lavender. I put up with you turning to mush when you went out with Ron, but Zabini? It can’t work. You know what he’s like; Daphne Greengrass is sobbing all over Hogwarts whilst he shags Pansy in his dorm.”  
  
“He- he said I was pretty.” The words came out before she could stop them.  
  
“Of course he did,” replied Parvati tartly. “It’s the easiest way to get a girl into bed ... you know that.”  
  
Lavender sighed. “It wasn’t like that.”  
  
“Don’t be so bloody naive, Lavender. It’s exactly like that.”  
  
Lavender looked into Parvati’s eyes. She could see a hardness there that hadn’t been present before, but then life under the Carrows was toughening them all up. Both Parvati and Padma had long stopped wearing bright decorations in their hair – the blue butterfly was something from the past.   
  
“You don’t seriously think he wants to be with you, do you?”  
  
Parvati’s insistent words broke the reverie; Lavender shook her head. “You’re right, I know that. A Gryffindor and a Slytherin – even last year it would have caused problems,” she assured her friend, then sought to change the subject. “Was I really that awful when I went out with Ron?”  
  
Parvati smiled. “Merlin, yes. You turned into some kind of soppy mush head. Don’t you remember ‘Won-won’?”  
  
Lavender blushed. “Wow – I really was awful.”  
  
Parvati shrugged. “He didn’t exactly complain, did he? Not whilst you were attached to his mouth.”  
  
Lavender giggled, remembering the snogging sessions that had left her gasping for air, but it was nothing compared to the sensations Blaise had uncovered.   
  


***

  
  
“Hagrid wants to see us,” Ginny announced one afternoon. She dropped her large bag, crammed with books, on one of the tables in the common room. “I’ve just had Care of Magical Creatures and he passed me a message saying he was holding a party next Friday.” She sighed. “I think it’s his way of showing support.”  
  
Seamus lifted his head up from the essay he was writing. “Support for what exactly?” he asked bitterly. There was a gash down his cheek and his lip was swollen where Alecto had lashed out at him that morning. “We didn’t stop their plans for the dungeons and now they’ve stopped teaching half-bloods Dark Arts, we can’t even defend ourselves. It’s a bloody joke.”  
  
“Stop that!” ordered Neville. “Seamus, mate, you have to calm down. We know this is hard. If it’s not you, then it’s Terry, Ernie or me being hexed. The important thing is that we don’t give up, okay.” He stared into Seamus’ eyes and then looked at all the others gathered around. “We’re all agreed on that, yes?”  
  
“Yes,” replied Lavender. She took Seamus’ hand and squeezed it. “Shall I take you to Madam Pomfrey?”  
  
Seamus sighed and squeezed her back. “Thanks, but Madam Pomfrey has been told not to treat any of us, and although she’s ready to tell Snape where to go, I don’t want to get her in trouble for this. It’ll be fine soon.” He took a deep breath and looked at Ginny. “Support for what?” he repeated, but in a much calmer tone.  
  
“Harry,” Ginny said simply. “And Ron and Hermione, too.”  
  
“Is there any news?” asked Parvati as Ginny sat very still on the arm of Seamus’ chair. They’d stopped talking about Harry unless Ginny volunteered information, knowing that she was sick with worry for the three of them.  
  
“Not really,” she replied at last. “I think Bill may have had contact with Ron, but I don’t know any more than that.” She paused. “Anyway, Hagrid wants to throw a party before we leave for Easter.”  
  
“Let’s go,” said Neville. “It’ll be good for morale. We’ll round up some of the others, too.”  
  
“It’ll look odd if we all go missing,” pondered Lavender. “Perhaps some of us should stay behind.”  
  
“Or we could stagger arrivals,” suggested Parvati. They both looked at Neville. He nodded abruptly.  
  
“Good idea. Ginny, tell Hagrid we’ll be there.”  
  


***

  
  
“You are distracted today, Miss Brown.” Firenze’s voice was low as he bent his head towards her.   
  
“Sorry, sir. What were you saying?”  
  
“I was merely remarking on your distraction,” he continued, “for the other pupils have started packing away their books, yet you are still lying there gazing at the ceiling, which is no longer lit by stars.”  
  
Lavender sat up. Behind Firenze, she could see Blaise by the door who moved aside as Parvati and Padma walked passed. It had surprised her last year to find him in her NEWT class; she had thought he would be scornful of Professor Trelawney, but although he’d remained largely silent in her class, he contributed to Firenze’s lessons with some insight. Tabitha Flint, Marcus and Jonah’s younger sister, stood next to him talking animatedly. Related by marriage now, he looked as if he were answering her questions a touch irritably.  
  
“Sir,” Blaise called and throwing off Tabitha’s arm, he walked back into the room.  
  
Firenze turned around. “Mr Zabini, you wish to speak to me?”  
  
Blaise cleared his throat. “Yes, sir. I have a query about my essay. May I speak with you in private?”  
  
Lavender began to pack her things away whilst Firenze moved towards the front of the class, by the large oak tree trunk. Blaise waited until his back was turned and then crouched in front of her on the pretext of doing up his shoe.   
  
“Meet me later,” he whispered urgently. “Outside Flitwick’s’ classroom.”  
  
“No,” she replied. It was the first time she’d been this close to him since that night and she was shocked to see how gaunt he was looking. He’d always had a perfect – almost sculpted – face with angular cheekbones, but the hollows in his cheeks and the dark shadows, only noticeable when close up, under his eyes, gave him a haunted look.  
  
“Please,” he urged her.  
  
“You wish to speak with me, Mr Zabini,” called Firenze.  
  
“Seven o’clock,” he whispered. “Please, Lavender. I  _must_  speak to you.”  
  
“I don’t know,” she said as she brushed passed him.  
  


***

  
  
“Thank Merlin you came,” Blaise whispered as he pulled her towards him and into the alcove beside the Charms classroom.   
  
Lavender pushed him away. “What do you want?” she asked coldly. “I shouldn’t be here, especially after what you accused me of last time.”  
  
“Shut up,” he hissed. “I can’t go into all that now. There’s no time.”  
  
“What do mean, no time?” she asked sharply.  
  
Blaise pulled her back into the alcove. “I wanted to see you. I wanted to talk about the other night – that’s why I asked you here -- but something’s happened.”   
  
He loosened his hold on her but Lavender did not move away. “What is it?” she asked urgently.  
  
“Snape and the Carrows know about the meeting at Hagrid’s. They’re on their way; thank God, you’re not there. I don’t want you hurt.” He bent forwards and tried to kiss her cheek, but Lavender wrenched away.  
  
“I have to warn them. Merlin, if the Carrows get them, they’ll make Seamus’ latest wound look like a Flobberworm bite.”  
  
Blaise dragged her back. “You can’t do anything,” he said fiercely. “The Carrows are taking a team with them. You won’t make it in time.”  
  
“They’re my friends, Zabini. I can’t just do nothing.” She wrenched herself away again and began to run to the staircase. She knew Neville, Seamus and Ginny were already there, along with Hannah and Susan. Her mind flitted to Ernie – perhaps he could help her, but if she stopped to look for him, it would be too late. She hurtled down the stairs, and then heard a thunderfall of footsteps behind her.   
  
“Wait!” called Blaise as he caught up with her. “You know this is stupid, don’t you? Stupid and reckless!”  
  
“I don’t have a choice,” she replied bleakly, and then she held out her wand. “Let me go or this time I  _will_  hex you.”  
  
He grimaced. “I wouldn’t dare stop you, Lavender. I can see you’re set on this.” He paused for breath. “Come on, I’ll go with you. But first ...”   
  
There was no time for surprise; Blaise grabbed her hand and pulled her into an empty classroom. He tapped her on the head and Lavender felt herself go very cold.  
  
“What are you doing?” she asked, her teeth chattering.  
  
“A Disillusion Charm. Renders you practically invisible.” She saw him tap himself and then he began to fade.  
  
He wasn’t invisible but blended with the background. If he moved, she could see his outline as it adjusted to the surroundings, but short of an Invisibility Cloak, it was the best she could hope for.  
  
Blaise took her hand. “Come on,” he murmured. “What are you waiting for?”  
  
They ran down three flights of stairs, grateful that at suppertime practically all the students were in the Great Hall.   
  
“Who have the Carrows got with them?” Lavender asked breathlessly.   
  
“Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle and Nott,” he replied. Although they’d been running fast, he was barely out of breath.  
  
“Nott! God, I didn’t think he had it in him,” she muttered as they ran into the grounds. The night air whipped around her face; her heart thumping inside her, but she could not stop.   
  
“Don’t underestimate Theo. He’s bright, Lavender – far brighter than Draco.”  
  
“Why aren’t you with them?” she asked as they ran hell for leather down the path to Hagrid’s hut.   
  
“I should be,” he said grimly.  
  
Looking back at him, she missed her footing and stumbled over a tree root. Blaise caught her arm.   
  
“How are you going to explain your absence?”   
  
Blaise shrugged. “I’ll think of something. Come on, we’re nearly there. Look, I can see his hut.”  
  
He pulled out his wand as they came to a standstill and tapped Lavender on the head. She felt a warmth steal over her. Blaise pulled her to him, and for a brief, crazy moment, she thought he was going to kiss her. “Go and warn them,” he muttered. “I’ll stay here.”  
  
“Thank you,” she murmured as she pulled herself away and hammered on Hagrid’s door.  
  
Hagrid, she had long ago realised, was not a subtle man. A huge banner proclaiming support for Harry hung across the beams of his hut. He’d laid out bottles of Butterbeer, large pitchers of Pumpkin juice and some rather strange looking cakes on a trestle table. Lavender burst into the room, noting despite her panic that Neville appeared to be enjoying a conversation with Hannah, leaving Susan excluded.   
  
“The Carrows are coming,” she yelled to the room. “You have to leave. Now!”  
  
There was a moment of hesitation. A moment where everyone froze, and then Neville pulled out his wand.   
  
“The backdoor. Wands out and evacuate – NOW!”  
  
Lavender marvelled briefly at Neville’s command as everyone instantly paid attention. They quickly filed to the back door. “Okay, guys, go the long way and get back into Hogwarts via the kitchens. Dobby will let you in. Ginny, show them the way.”   
  
There was another hammering at the door and Amycus Carrow’s gloating voice rang out. “Let us in, Hagrid, and you’ll survive this time.”  
  
“Never!” shouted Hagrid. From a pink umbrella, he produced a wand, and then, waiting until the hut was clear, he burst out of his front door. The Carrows and the Slytherins began firing curses at him. “You won’t take me alive, Carrow.”  
  
Lavender ran out the back door. She could see the spell light from hexes out the front. Neville was ahead of her – safely away – but she needed to know. She stopped and began edging around the hut. Hagrid stood tall and proud. He carried Fang in one hand and felled Amycus with one blow of his other. Alecto cast a jinx at him but it stopped in mid air, before it could touch Hagrid. Gasping with understanding, Lavender realised that Blaise was still there, casting spells to protect her ally. Alecto raised her wand again aiming wildly around her into the clearing. Seizing his chance, Hagrid fled.  
  
Hiding behind a pumpkin in his garden, Lavender watched in horror as the Slytherin posse approached. It was too late to run. Grasping her wand firmly, she wondered if she could at least injure one of them, but it was one against six – she stood no chance.  
  
Something pulled her to the ground and she felt a stream of coldness run through her again as he rendered her invisible.   
  
“Stay still,” Blaise hissed.  
  
She could feel him shivering slightly, although the night wasn’t cold, and in alarm, she placed her hand on his chest. She felt something wet and tried not to gasp as she smelt it and realised it was blood. Blaise hushed her with his hand over her mouth, but he couldn’t stop shaking.  
  
“Keep still,” he rasped.  
  
“You’re hurt,” she whispered.  
  
“I’m fine. Keep still and they won’t see us.”  
  
At last, the group disappeared, Alecto cackling all the way. When they’d gone, Lavender rose and tried to pull Blaise to his feet. He stumbled into her.   
  
“What happened?”  
  
“A hex,” he gasped. “I don’t know who cast it.”  
  
“I’ll get you to the hospital wing.”  
  
“No.” Blaise shuddered. “They’ll know I was here then.” Lavender could see beads of sweat forming on his head. “I know the cure. I can sort this myself. I just need to get to the Potions storeroom.”  
  
“I’ll help.”  
  
“No, you have to go, now!” But he stumbled into her again.   
  
“I’m not leaving you. Tell me what to do.”   
  
She placed an arm under his shoulders and supported him to the castle. As they approached, Lavender steered Blaise around the side and to the kitchen door. “You must make me visible, so I can get in,” she whispered. Blaise nodded and tapped her again. He was flagging now, as she led him through the kitchens, and she could feel his blood soaking though her shirt. Once past the entrance to the Hufflepuff common room, they crossed the Entrance Hall and headed down towards the dungeons. Wending their way through the maze of corridors, they finally reached the Potions storeroom. Blaise muttered something under his breath, the door creaked open and Lavender half-walked half-dragged Blaise across the threshold.  
  
It was dark and dank inside. Lavender, who had never been adept at Potions, had not been here before. She could smell the musty herbs that hung in bunches from the beams, and see the rows of multi -coloured liquids that filled bottles of every shape and size. In one corner a small, pewter cauldron was bubbling and in an open draw, she could see what looked like newts eyes laid out to dry.   
  
“Leave me,” Blaise commanded.  
  
“I can’t,” she replied. “Let me help.”  
  
“Merlin you’re a stubborn witch, Lavender Brown.”  
  
“Yep, so stop arguing, Blaise Zabini, and tell me what to do,” she answered with determination in her voice.  
  
Blaise slumped to the floor, his hand attempting to undo the buttons of his shirt. Lavender bent down and carefully peeled the shirt off where it had stuck to his chest. There was a gaping wound across his shoulder veering into his chest.  
  
“What do you need?” Blaise was shaking more than ever now and she could see his eyes losing focus. She snapped her fingers in front of his face. “Blaise!”  
  
He shook his head, took a deep breath and began to speak. “Comfrey, St John’s Wort, extract of dragon bile, and lavender.”  
  
“Yes?”  
  
He smiled, a faint ghost of a smile. “No, you need to get some lavender – it has healing properties.”  
  
She smiled back. “Let’s hope I live up to my name.”  
  
She scoured the shelves, which were fortunately in very good order, so she was able to pull down all the ingredients quickly.  
  
“You need to make a poultice,” he said and she could hear the pain in his voice. “Just mix the ingredients together – you won’t need a cauldron –make something like a bread dough, and then pack the wound with it. His breathing was becoming laboured. “First of all, get me that bottle.”  
  
She looked to where he was pointing, at a thin medicine bottle filled with a dark maroon liquid. She raced to get it. “What is it?” she asked Blaise as he took a slug.  
  
“Mead,” he replied in short gasping sentences. “Slughorn’s secret supply. Best pain relief there is.” He held out the bottle. “It’s good for nerves too.”  
  
She took a sip and then a glug. She returned to the table and mixed the ingredients to Blaise’s instructions. Within twenty minutes, and as Blaise seemed to be slipping into delirium, she had a thick doughy paste.   
  
He writhed in pain as the compress touched the wound. Lavender tried to peel it off, but he grabbed her hand. “Don’t. I know it’ll hurt, but it’s necessary. “He picked up the mead bottle again and took another slug. Lavender pressed the rest of the poultice further into his shoulder and chest. When she was finished, she attempted to stand up but he clutched at her. “Please ... stay for a bit.”  
  
“I’m not going anywhere,” she replied softly. She walked across to the old cast iron sink in the corner and wet a cloth. Then, walking back to Blaise, she dabbed his head. It was odd seeing him this vulnerable. The glimpse she’d had of him in Slughorn’s study, when he’d talked of his family and his real father, had not prepared her for this – his need for her. As the poultice soaked in and Blaise shuddered convulsively, Lavender held his hand -- and then held him close. At last, he seemed to quieten and she released her hold, but Blaise’s grip tightened. He opened his eyes, suddenly alert.   
  
“Stay down,” he whispered. “I can hear something.”  
  
Lavender jerked her head around and straining her ears heard the sound of footsteps along the corridor.  
  
“We injured one of the little bastards,” Amycus was saying. “Draco heard someone cry out.”  
  
“And you think the culprit will have made his way to my store cupboard?” Professor Slughorn sounded slightly annoyed by the whole subject.   
  
“Well, Pomfrey 'asn’t 'ad any visitors – Alecto made sure of that.” He laughed nastily. “Your security had better be good, Slug.”  
  
“Yes, yes,” said Slughorn. “Only myself and the Headmaster can get in.”  
  
Lavender heard a rattling at the door and looked fearfully at Blaise, but he was concentrating hard. For the third time that evening, she felt cold as he Disillusioned her. Then she saw him do the same thing to himself. “Don’t worry,” he whispered.  
  
“The storeroom is locked,” Slughorn said, “and the charm has not been tampered with.”  
  
There was an aching silence and Lavender could hear her heart thumping in her chest. She began to shake, sure that Amycus was about to break the door down.   
  
“Another locking charm won’t hurt,” she heard him say. Amycus muttered something and Lavender saw the door move slightly. He laughed again and then both men walked away.   
  
“Fuck!” muttered Blaise. He sat up and cast the counter spell on the pair of them. “I’m afraid we’re stuck here, Miss Brown, until Slughorn opens up in the morning.”  
  
Her eyes widened in horror. “Then he’ll know you were in the woods.”  
  
“He already knows, Lavender. Professor Slughorn lied when he told Amycus that the charm hadn’t been tampered with. He told me how to unlock the door weeks ago because I assist him sometimes with Potions prep.” He frowned in concentration. “Look, Slughorn knows I’m here, but not you. When he opens up in the morning, I’ll Disillusion you. If anyone else is with him, then I’ll say I was locked in. The only problem is my shirt ... and yours too. If we’re seen soaked in blood ... Why are you smiling?”  
  
“Because, Zabini, I may not be good at Potions, but I  _am_  good at Charms.” She pointed her wand at his discarded shirt.  _“Evanesco!”_ The blood vanished.  
  
Lavender smiled a touch sadly. “My mum would be so proud of me for that.”  
  
Blaise looked at her. “Your mum’s a Muggleborn. Is she okay?”  
  
“I don’t know,” muttered Lavender, looking at the ground. “She sent me a message at Christmas and I think I’d have heard if she’d been caught ... Oh God!” She stood up. “Why am I telling you all this? I swore I wouldn’t tell anyone.” She raised her voice. “Why am I telling  _you_  – a Slytherin? You could tell anyone.”  
  
“Hey,” he said angrily. “I thought you knew me better than that.” He tried to stand up but was evidently still weak. He sank to the floor again. “For fuck’s sake, Lavender, I told you about my real blood status ... and I had far less reason to trust you.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her to the ground. “I’m not going to tell anyone about your mum. Trust me.”  
  
She stared intently into his dark almost purple eyes. Her head screamed caution, but something else – perhaps it was her gut – told her he was sincere.  
  
“Why did you tell me?” she asked at last. “I could have used it against you.”  
  
“Huh? Well, for one thing I thought Gryffindors were honourable,” he said sarcastically, but then he grinned at her. “Actually, as soon as you turned away, I considered using a Memory charm on you. It was probably the stupidest thing I’d done, but there’s something about you, Lavender, that invites confidences. Then I convinced myself that I could just bluff my way out of anything you said – I’m good at that.”  
  
Lavender fell silent. She looked down at her own shirt, Blaise’s blood, dry now, had stained one side. “I haven’t even thanked you,” she said.  
  
“I think your help just now makes up for a lack of a word,” he replied. He shifted himself into a seated position and peeled off the poultice.   
  
“We could have been killed tonight, couldn’t we?” she said tremulously and began to shake.  
  
Blaise shuffled towards her and gathered her to him. Placing his hand under her chin and tilting her head upwards, he very slowly and very tenderly kissed her. “I won’t let anyone hurt you,” he murmured as his lips brushed her ear.   
  
She could feel his warm breath on her neck, and then she began to kiss him back.  
  
“Oh, gods, Lavender,” he muttered as her hands traced the muscles on his back. He lay her down on the floor and propping himself on one arm he slowly began to slide his hand underneath her shirt. His hand came into contact with her bra and, as he pulled down one strap, he began to kiss her shoulder. His lips moved down and she placed her hands around his waist. They stared at each other and then Blaise started to undo all the buttons on her shirt. She sat up slightly and shrugged it off. Looking at her all the while, Blaise undid her bra and then, cupped her breasts in his hands. He dropped a soft kiss onto her lips and then his mouth moved downwards.   
  
“If I don’t stop now, Lavender, I won’t be able to,” he muttered.  
  
Lavender pulled his head towards her and kissed him hard. “Then don’t stop,” she whispered.  
  
“Only if you’re sure,” he replied softly.  
  
Lavender nodded. Her hands moved to the buckle on his belt and fumbled as they encountered his skin. Wordlessly, Blaise pulled off his jeans, and then his hands moved up her skirt. As his fingertips traced the soft flesh of her inner thigh, Lavender felt herself melt.  
  
“Are you sure?” he asked again.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
Blaise shifted his weight until he was on top of her and Lavender moved her legs apart, winding them around his waist. She felt a stab of pain and a dull ache as he entered her, and then she moulded herself around him and the rhythm of his movements. Blaise groaned as he juddered to a halt.   
  
Gasping, he collapsed on her. Lavender lay very still, the reality of what had just happened was sinking in and she could feel tears in her eyes. She’d wanted this, but ... was that it?   
  
“Fuck, I’m sorry. That was bloody selfish,” muttered Blaise.  
  
Lavender felt the ache recede as Blaise began to kiss her again and stroked her hair. “That’s not how I pictured our first time,” he whispered after a while. “Not on the floor of Sluggy’s storeroom.”  
  
“You pictured this already?” she asked – astonished.  
  
Blaise shifted his weight slightly. “Since snogging you in Slughorn’s office it’s been kind of constant.” He paused and began to kiss her shoulder. “I expect Weasley found somewhere much more convivial.”  
  
Lavender smiled slightly as she remembered Ron’s hands tentatively flirting with her breasts before he took fright. “I never got this far with him,” she said and blushed. “I’ve never gone this far with anyone.”   
  
“Oh, shit!” responded Blaise. “Bloody hell, Lavender, if I’d known, I would have ...”  
  
“Would have what? Stopped?”  
  
Blaise rubbed his eyes with one hand. “No, probably not, I’m not that noble, but I would have been gentler. Did I hurt you?” His hand moved away from her breast and splayed out on her belly.  
  
“A bit,” she admitted. Then she lifted her hands to his neck and pulled him towards her. “Where did you picture us?”  
  
“Anywhere but here,” he replied. Then he smiled. “I have a house in Italy that I inherited when I came of age. It has a wonderful four poster bed and I thought of you lying back on the white cotton sheets.” He shook his head. “I can’t get you there now, not the way things are, but I promise the next time will be somewhere more -- ” he searched for the word “-- more romantic.”  
  
“There’ll be a next time then?” she asked with surprise in her voice. Blaise’s fingertips began to trace circles on her thigh and she moaned as they made their way upwards, stopping only to part her damp hair. Smiling, he kissed her belly.   
  
“Yes,” he murmured softly as her insides turned to molten gold, “There will be a next time.”  
  


***

  
  
“I can’t believe,” he said later, “that you and Weasley didn’t do this. You were both so ... so ...  _tactile_. He was always groping you.”  
  
Lavender shrugged. “Towards the end, I thought about it. I thought if we had sex then he’d stay, but ...” She sighed. “I don’t want to talk about Ron. He’s part of a different life – not,” she added slyly, “like you and Pansy.”  
  
Blaise had the grace to look ashamed at this point; then he chuckled. “There’s nothing going on between me and Pansy. She’s trying to wind Draco up, and I guess I was trying to get a reaction out of you.”  
  
Lavender sat up. “But I thought you dumped Daphne for her.”  
  
“Gods. You witches certainly like to gossip.” He pulled her back towards him. “The reason I broke up with Daphne,” he said as he slid his hand up and down her side, “was because when I was kissing her, I kept wishing she was you. I like Daphne and that wasn’t fair.”  
  
Lavender blushed, then smiled warmly. Staring into his eyes, she noticed the dark circles under his eyes had deepened. “You should sleep,” she said, and began to pull her shirt on.  
  
“Yeah,” he replied, yawning. “It’s been an eventful night to say the least.”  
  
Summoning his cloak, he arranged it over both of them. Lavender settled herself into the crook of his arm and felt his breathing slow as he dropped off. Her eyelids began to droop.   
  


***

  
  
“Horace, open the door!” Lavender awoke with a start on hearing Snape’s voice.   
  
“Blaise,” she hissed. “Snape’s outside with Slughorn. Wake up.”  
  
Instantly alert, Blaise swore, but in one fluid movement, he cast a Disillusion Charm upon her and then grabbed his shirt. He cleared his throat. “Hello,” he shouted. “Professor Slughorn, is that you?”  
  
The door swung open to reveal Snape and Slughorn, but not, Lavender noted with relief, the Carrows.   
  
“Blaise, my boy,” cried Professor Slughorn. Lavender marvelled at the surprise he conjured in his voice. “What are you doing in here?”  
  
“I got shoved in here and then locked in last night,” Blaise explained angrily as he pulled his cloak around him.   
  
“I understood the door was locked with an additional charm, Zabini,” Snape stated. “Why didn’t you call out when Professor Carrow was here?”  
  
“I must have been asleep, sir,” said Blaise. Lavender saw him gesture towards a bottle. “I’m afraid I got stuck into your bottle of mead, Professor Slughorn. I shall, of course, replace it.”  
  
“You were alone then?” asked Snape, his eyes flitting around the room. He looked directly at Blaise who stood firmly in front of the recumbent form of Lavender.   
  
“Yes, sir,” Blaise replied.   
  
“Headmaster,” interjected Slughorn. “Blaise is no doubt hungry and tired. Might I suggest we let him go and carry on this interview later today?”  
  
Snape nodded. “Very well. My office at ten o’clock, Zabini.”  
  
He strode out of the room. Blaise stood still and then Professor Slughorn turned to him.   
  
“I don’t know why you broke in last night, or who you were with, but it’s lucky for you that _I_  found this on the floor and not the headmaster.” He paused and then added coldly, “In the past it has amused me how young ladies take great care to adorn their hair. However, I doubt you’ll find a Slytherin witch who would wear this particular trinket.” Lavender stifled a groan as she saw Blaise take her red and gold hair slide from Slughorn’s hand. The professor turned on his heel intent on leaving the room, but as he got to the door he turned his head “Do not expect me to cover for you again, Zabini. You are not worth my neck.”


	4. Stopping by Woods

_A brisk young man, dilly dilly, met with a maid,  
And laid her down, dilly dilly, under the shade._

  
  
  
It was the smell of her that drew him in. Blaise knew that. When he’d inhaled Amortentia, he’d been shocked at what it had revealed. Lavender was a pretty girl and so Blaise had noticed her. But to have the proof, the utmost proof, laid bare in that Potions lesson had hit him like a hex.   
  
Shortly after that, he’d been standing in the Entrance Hall and he’d seen her with her friend – one of the Patil girls. They were whispering about something, giggling a bit, and Blaise had wondered why. That surprised him, for he was a boy who didn’t particularly care for company. He’d pass the time of day with Malfoy and his stooges, but he didn’t have a best friend – he didn’t need one. Suddenly she’d turned around and bestowed a wide smile on him and impulsively (another surprise, for he was never impulsive), he’d smiled back. Then he realised that she wasn’t smiling at him, but at Weasley, and he’d scowled because he’d so nearly made a fool out of himself.   
  
 _Weasley, bloody Weasley._  A prat. A joke. But she had smiled at him. She’d draped herself over him for two terms after that and Blaise had refused to look. He’d decided that she was a stupid, gossipy, silly girl. But, Merlin, when her hair swung loose and spilled onto her shoulders, Blaise had a hard time looking away.   
  
Alone in his dormitory, attempting but failing to catch up on his sleep, Blaise thought about Lavender Brown and that warm, encompassing smile. Then he thought about their night together and he grinned, absurdly pleased that he’d been her first.  
  
“Weasley,” he muttered to the empty room. “You don’t know what you missed.”   
  
He rose from his bed and walked to the Headmaster’s office. As was his custom, he arrived early because he never knew what he could overhear by turning up before he was expected. To his astonishment, he heard the current headmaster talking to his predecessor. Blaise was surprised, because despite  _The Prophet_  telling the wizarding world that Potter had killed Albus Dumbledore, the majority of the students knew otherwise. When Blaise had been here before, his old Headmaster’s portrait had remained silent, never talking to his killer.   
  
“They caught no one then?” he heard Dumbledore ask.  
  
“No one,” Snape replied sharply. “Madame Pomfrey has not reported any casualties either, although she could be hiding something from me. Draco certainly reports that he fired a hex at someone and heard them yelp.”  
  
Blaise grimaced. He was pretty sure he hadn’t ‘yelped’. He felt his shoulder throbbing. _Bloody Malfoy,_  he thought. Then his ears pricked up as he heard Dumbledore mention  _his_ name.   
  
“And Mr Zabini was missing all night?”  
  
There was a pause before Snape replied. “He says he was locked in the storeroom ... alone.”  
  
Dumbledore chuckled. “But you don’t quite believe him.”  
  
Blaise could almost hear Snape’s thought process. “Alone? Possibly – I saw no one there. However, he has shown a distaste for the Carrows’ forms of discipline and has absented himself from detentions. Locking himself in the storeroom all night seems a touch extreme, unless there was another reason he wished to be out all night.” He paused; Blaise stopped breathing hoping that Snape would carry on before he remembered he was about to see him. He had to stop himself exhaling loudly when Snape continued. “Amycus is not altogether happy with my choice of Head Boy.”  
  
“And you, Severus? Are you happy with him?”  
  
“He has charm, when he chooses to use it, a certain arrogance and is quite bright. I think, Dumbledore, even you would have  _considered_  him. Although,” he continued witheringly, “I doubt you would have chosen anyone except Potter.”  
  
Dumbledore appeared to ignore the last statement although Blaise could imagine him smiling slightly at Snape’s obvious hatred for Potter.   
  
Taking a deep breath, Blaise knocked on the slightly open door and walked in at Snape’s command.  
  


***

  
  
He left, twenty minutes later, feeling as if he’d only escaped censure by the skin of his teeth. He had stuck to his story about being locked in, drinking too much mead and thus being insensible when Amycus had double-charmed the door. Snape had glared at him with a frightening intensity, and Blaise had not been able to shut off his thoughts before a picture of himself and a light-brown haired girl swam in front of him. Snape had pursed his lips into a thin line and raised one eyebrow.   
  
“Zabini, there are more important things going on in this school than romantic entanglements, and you would do well to remember that.”  
  
Blaise had cast his eyes to the floor, thanking Merlin that Snape had not seen the face of the girl. “Can I go, sir?” he’d asked.  
  
Snape had waved a hand irritably, but as Blaise reached the door, he called him back.  
  
“Slytherins and Gryffindors have been enemies for centuries. It cannot work,” Snape said bleakly.  
  
Blaise jerked his head upwards. “Salazar and Godric were friends once, sir, weren’t they?”   
  
And Snape had looked across at him thoughtfully, but said nothing.  
  
Blaise had nodded and left the office. He walked down the moving staircases, avoiding trick steps with aplomb, and trying not to notice how many of the younger pupils seemed to fear him. The older pupils from other Houses veered away as he passed them. He’d never been a popular boy, but he’d not been hated – not like Malfoy. Blaise had liked talking to one or two of the Ravenclaws; Anthony Goldstein had proved a decent chess player, and the Hufflepuffs too hadn’t been openly hostile. Blaise had thought Justin Fitch-Fletchley a decent enough boy when they’d had Charms together, but as a pureblood he’d known he wouldn’t be friends with him.  
  
“Except,” he muttered, “I’m not a pureblood.”  
  
The Gryffindors, however, were a different matter. As Snape had said, they were natural enemies and he’d never sought their friendship or approval. Blaise slowed as he reached his destination and leant against the wall.  _So why am I so attracted to her?_  he thought. _I’m behaving like a stupid, reckless Gryffindor, but I can’t seem to stop._  
  
“Are you here to see me, Mr Zabini?” Firenze’s voice caused Blaise to wake from his contemplation.   
  
“No, sir,” he replied. “I arranged to meet someone here, that’s all.” He looked around. “But he’s not here. It’s not important.”  
  
As he turned away, he felt Firenze’s hand on his shoulder. “You’ll find Miss Brown inside. She has offered to help me, although on a day like this, I thought she’d enjoy being outside more.”  
  
“M –miss Brown?” stammered Blaise. “No, I’m meeting someone else.”  
  
Firenze smiled. “Come, come, Mr Zabini. I do not pretend to be a great Seer but I am adept at reading my pupils. It would not be wise to be seen together, but I will allow you to talk a while.”  
  
Blaise did not need telling again. He entered the classroom to see Lavender in one corner, sorting parchment and tying bunches of sage together with fine strands of unicorn hair. She turned her head as he approached and Blaise caught his breath when she bestowed that wide smile only on him. The hairclip Professor Slughorn had found was still in his pocket, for he’d hurried her out of the storeroom as soon as Slughorn’s back was turned, and she’d not tied her hair up again. He longed to touch it, to wind it around his fingers, and breathe in her scent as he moved the silken tresses away from her neck.  
  
“You got back all right?” he murmured as he bent down to pick up the parchment at her feet.  
  
“Yes, although ...”  
  
“What?”  
  
Lavender sighed. “I had to lie to the others about where I’d been all night. Parvati had been sick with worry and Seamus wanted to go and search for me.”  
  
“He didn’t though?”  
  
“No, Ginny persuaded him to stay put. She’d seen the Carrows and Slytherins return empty-handed, assumed I’d run back with Hannah and was now in the Hufflepuff common room.”  
  
“I assume they know you weren’t there.”  
  
She grinned. “I told Parvati that I spent the night in here.” She paused, picked up some sage and gathered it in a bunch. “Have you seen Snape yet?”  
  
“Yep. He ... err ... knows I was with someone in that storeroom and he dropped a strong hint about staying away from Gryffindors, but –” He shrugged. “—he can’t prove anything.” Blaise stretched out his hand and very gently ran a finger up her arm. “When can I see you again?”  
  
“You still want to, in spite of Professor Snape’s warning?”   
  
“He didn’t say I had to stop seeing you,” he murmured. He collected a unicorn hair and wound it around the sage that she was still holding. Their fingers touched and he faltered.  
  
Behind him, he could hear Firenze. “I will be back in ten minutes. I advise you to be gone by then.” Blaise waited until he heard the door close and then he turned back to Lavender.   
  
“Are you going home for Easter?” he asked, thinking that it would be infinitely easier to arrange to meet away from Hogwarts.  
  
She shook her head. “Dad says the situation at the Ministry is very stressful and he’s under suspicion. He thinks I’m safer here.”  
  
“Okay,” he replied. “My mum is away with husband number eight and although I could spend the holiday with my new step family ...” He thought of Tabitha’s rather insistent invitation last week. “I can easily tell Snape that I’m staying. It should be quieter for one thing ... but err...” He felt embarrassed but knew he had to broach the subject. As he spoke, he placed his hand on her cheek. He could feel her quiver and then she turned her head slightly and kissed his palm. “We weren’t exactly careful last night. You should go and see Madam Pomfrey about ... err... contraception and stuff.” He leant forward intent on kissing her when suddenly he saw her face contort.  _Shit! I’ve misjudged this._  “Or,” he said, backtracking, “I’ll go and see her and get –”  
  
She pushed him away angrily. “Get off me!”  
  
“What the ...”  
  
“Touch me again, Zabini and I’ll hex you!”  
  
“Are you okay, Lavender?” asked a voice from the shadows and Blaise understood. Finnegan was standing at the door.  
  
“It was an accident, Brown,” Blaise replied coldly. “I have no wish to ‘touch’ you.” He stepped back and Lavender fled to the door.   
  
“Did he try something?” he heard Finnegan ask.   
  
“No, Seamus. I’m okay,” she answered. “I probably misunderstood. After all, why would the Head Boy wish to dirty his hands on filth like me?”  
  
Finnegan held out his hand and Blaise felt a stab of envy as Lavender slipped her hand into his so readily. He watched her go, but then, as they reached the door, she turned back briefly and mouthed, “Sorry.”   
  
The jealousy died down instantly. Blaise fingered the hairclip in his pocket and returned to the boxes of parchment. He knew the other Slytherins found it odd that he’d chosen to study Divination at N.E.W.T. level and if Firenze hadn’t become his teacher in the fifth year, he would have dropped it with no regrets. But the centaur had opened his eyes to something new. He was an outsider, yet he had a quiet assurance and commanding authority that held his students attention.   
  
“Miss Brown has gone.” Firenze’s soft voice echoed through the classroom.  
  
“Yes, sir. Thank you for this. It must look strange to you.”  
  
Firenze walked slowly towards him. “Mr Zabini, I have long since ceased to be surprised at any of your kinds’ deeds.”  
  
“You don’t approve.” Blaise sat on one of the boulders.   
  
“I would not wish Miss Brown to be punished by  _anyone_  for an unwise liaison. You, I think, have the ear of those in power. Miss Brown has her friends but she will not want them involved.”   
  
“So I shouldn’t see her again. Is that what you’re saying?”  
  
Firenze paused. He gathered up Lavender’s bunches of sage and packed them in a box. “Centaurs do not  _love_. We mate – that is all. Love is a human weakness. But ...” He finished sealing the box and looked directly at Blaise, his pale eyes wise and kind. “I have thought for some time now that love may be the only thing that pulls us through this struggle. Slytherin and Gryffindor – I do not understand your obsession with Sorting – you are merely pupils to me. But I urge caution, for her sake, as well as yours.”  
  
Blaise slumped to the floor and ran his hands over his head. “I’m a Slytherin. We’re cautious and cunning by nature. It isn’t love, but I don’t think I can give her up – not now.”  
  
“Then you must watch your backs, for you will have few friends.”  
  


***

  
  
Aware he was under close scrutiny from not only Professor Snape, Professor Slughorn, and now Finnegan, Blaise kept his head down during the last week of term. Lavender, he noticed, was keeping her distance, barely glancing his way in any of their shared lessons. He admired her composure ... but then came Muggle Studies where Alecto decided to devote her whole lesson to the sterilization of Muggle-borns.   
  
“They have come by their magic falsely. They have tricked good wizards and witches from their wands and they should not be allowed to breed. Their children are vermin. Don’t you agree, Brown?”  
  
Lavender did not speak and the class, which had been muttering in low-level whispers throughout Alecto’s speech, fell silent. Blaise noticed Pansy smirking, but Daphne’s eyes were downcast. Draco, however, looked as if he were somewhere else – not concentrating on the lesson and gazing fixedly at the window.   
  
“I asked you a question, Brown,” snarled Alecto. “Are you vermin?”  
  
 _Don’t react. Don’t react. Don’t react._ Blaise pleaded silently, but Lavender was not a Legilimans.   
  
“If I were vermin, Professor Carrow, I’d hardly be allowed to attend Hogwarts to learn from such marvellous teachers,” she said, overloading her words with such sincerity that no one could doubt the sarcasm. “My dad is a wizard. Doesn’t that entitle me to my wand, whatever my mum’s  _crime?_  
  
Alecto whipped out her wand, but instead of a quick hex, she hit Lavender across the face. Blaise saw an angry welt appear across her cheek and he closed his eyes, but Lavender did not cry out. Finnegan and Longbottom stood up instantly, but Lavender hissed at them to sit down. Blaise could practically see Alecto’s mind whirring as she wondered what punishment to dish out.  
  
“Professor,” he called out, injecting a hint of casual boredom in his voice. “Would you deal with Squibs the same way?”  
  
Startled by the change of subject, Alecto turned to Blaise. “Well, Mr Zabini, Squibs are obviously not worthy to be admitted to our society, however they know their place and are not treacherous.”  
  
On that vein, she continued until the end of the lesson. Blaise watched Lavender as she quickly packed up her books and left the class arm in arm with Parvati – Longbottom and Finnegan flanking them both. He stared at her, willing her to look around, but she would be a fool to look back now, and he knew, however giddy she appeared, she wasn’t a fool.  
  
Divination was their last shared lesson. Only he and Tabitha took the subject from Slytherin House. There were two Ravenclaws, Padma Patil and Lisa Turpin; three Hufflepuffs, Hannah Abbot, Susan Bones and Zacharias Smith, and finally the two Gryffindor girls. Parvati was watching him as he sat down. He stared ahead, ignoring her.   
  
“The phases of the moon,” began Firenze, “are known to you all from your Astronomy class. But their relevance to the future may not be so easily divined. You do not have to be a werewolf to feel the effects.” He stopped. “Miss Brown, will you hand out the moon charts?”  
  
Seizing what would be his only chance Blaise tore a scrap of parchment from his roll and hastily scribbled a note. He folded it small into the cup of his hand and then, as she handed him the chart, passed the note without looking at her. Their fingers touched briefly and he thought she lingered longer than absolutely necessary, but then she turned to Tabitha.   
  
 _‘Here. Sunday. 7pm.’_  He’d written. Blaise knew she coudn’t reply without raising suspicion from Parvati or Hannah Abbot who seemed to be regarding him closely too.   
  
The lesson dragged, although Blaise was aware that Firenze was being far less ethereal than usual. In past years, the students had always enjoyed the lessons at the end of term. Only Snape and McGonagall had kept them working to the bitter end, but this year Blaise’s classmates had been lacklustre. He found himself almost wanting Weasley to appear because, although he was a prat, he had livened up lessons for a while with his stupid jokes.   
  
At last the bell sounded. He watched as Lavender dawdled at packing her things away. Parvati stayed by her side, so there would be no chance for any conversation. As Lavender stood up something fell from her sleeve and, without a backward glance, she walked off with Parvati. Smiling, Blaise walked forwards and picked up his small scrap of parchment. She’d scrawled ‘I’ll try’ on the back.  
  
He wasn’t sure whether it was easier to arrange an assignation in the holidays, or harder. On the one hand, there were fewer students around. This meant that they all shared one table at mealtimes so, theoretically, Blaise should have been able to mutter something to Lavender. But Tabitha had also stayed here for the break and she made it plain that Blaise would have to sit next to her. Ironically, as he became more reckless, Lavender appeared to be developing caution and would give no indication that she even knew he was there. Of the seventh year Gryffindors, only Lavender and Longbottom were at Hogwarts. They would sit as far away as they could from him joined by Hannah Abbot and Smith. In Slytherin, Daphne had also stayed at the castle. Blaise knew she didn’t want to return home to the Greengrass mansion because she found her mother’s constant talk of marriage and suitable men annoying. Daphne was bright and didn’t want to marry young. Tabitha, he wondered about. She seemed to make a beeline for him, thinking that the family connection could link into a relationship.   
  
“Oh, Mother,” he muttered. “Why in Helga’s name did you have to fall for a Flint?”   
  
On the other hand, he was now far easier to spot moving around the castle. With his colouring and very different looks, Blaise had long accepted that he was noticeable. It made it harder to be discreet, but his authority now coupled with his ‘aloofness’ gave him a degree of privacy. People were not that interested in someone that never gave them the time of day.  
  
On Sunday, he woke early and, sauntering up the stairs from his dorm, let himself into the Potions storeroom. Then, after a day spent pretending to do homework, when in reality he was letting his mind drift to the possibilities of the evening, Blaise broke into classroom eleven and added his own touches to the woodland room. He’d promised her romance and although he’d only half meant it at the time, now, as he thought about it, he became enthusiastic.  
  
First, he lit the ceiling, the way he’d seen Firenze do; it looked like midnight with stars set bright. Then he produced candles and placing them atop the biggest tree trunks, he lit them with gentle pink flames. Finally, he laid a soft blanket and some cushions on the thick mossy ground in the clearing. He took a step back, admiring his work. It was six thirty – now all he needed to do was wait.   
  
Lavender arrived at seven thirty-three. Blaise knew the exact time because he was staring at his watch wondering whether she’d appear, hoping she was on her way, scared she’d been caught.  
  
“I’m sorry,” she said as she closed the door softly behind her. Blaise, so pleased to see her, cast a locking charm on the door and then held out his arms. Lavender tripped across the classroom to him, almost knocking him off his feet in the fervency of her approach. “I had to wait for Professor McGonagall to leave our common room, and then Neville wanted to talk. I told him I needed air and he offered to come with me. Merlin, I don’t know what I would have done if Hannah hadn’t appeared.” She giggled nervously, and then looked about her in awe. “Oh, Blaise, this is beautiful.”  
  
Blaise felt a glow of pride at her obvious appreciation. “I promised you romance. It’s not much, but I hope you see it as an escape,” he murmured as he took one hand and led her to the rug. Pulling her down to the cushions, he stroked her hair. “If you’ve changed your mind,” he began, praying that she hadn’t, “then I’ll understand.”  
  
In reply, Lavender laughed slightly and her hand moved inside his shirt, tracing the scar on his chest. “Does it still hurt?”   
  
He shook his head, luxuriating in the soft touch of her fingers as they trailed down to his stomach. Then, as she tipped her face upwards, he caught sight of the welt across her face that she’d tried to disguise with make-up. Reluctantly he removed her hand from his waistband; Lavender gave him a puzzled look.   
  
“Why did you answer Alecto like that? You must have known how she’d react.”  
  
“You think it’s right that she can say those things to me?” she argued. Her eyes flashed as she sat up and moved away from him.   
  
Blaise reached for her hand and brushed his lips against it. “No, of course not. But if you keep your head down, and your mouth shut, then you won’t get hurt.”  
  
“I should be docile and meek, you mean.” She lowered her voice but he could hear a dangerous edge in her words.  
  
“Just don’t challenge the Carrows so much, that’s all I’m saying. Why is that so hard for you to understand?” He sat up and pulled her into his arms but she stayed still.   
  
“Blaise,” she said at last, “I was put in detention for saying something innocuous about your mother. I had the Cruciatus curse fired at me for that, yet Alecto is allowed to teach us that  _my_  mother is filth and that I’m vermin. If I give in ... she’s won.”  
  
Blaise dropped his arms from her, aware his plans were going horribly awry. He wanted to forget the war and everything at Hogwarts, but it was a wall between them. “I don’t like seeing you hurt,” he admitted. He stood up and reaching for his wand, began to pile the cushions into a box by the corner.   
  
“What are you doing?” Lavender asked.   
  
He shrugged. “Tidying up,” he muttered morosely. “I assume you’re leaving now.”  
  
“Why do you assume that?”  
  
He turned around, hearing a breathy tone in her voice. Lavender was lying back on one large velvet cushion that he’d pinched from the common room. Her hair spilling on the gold fringing and she was smiling nervously. “I’m not leaving yet,” She reached out a hand and he sat back down beside her. “I went to all the trouble and embarrassment of seeing Madam Pomfrey to get the most disgusting Potion imaginable, and now you’re telling me you’re leaving –”   
  
Blaise stopped her babbling with a kiss. He watched in gentle amusement as she sighed and closed her eyes in anticipation. Then he lay down next to her and Summoned a small bottle.   
  
“What’s that?” she asked curiously, as she opened her eyes.   
  
“Uh, a kind of mood enhancer, I suppose. What does this remind you of?” he asked as he uncorked the bottle. He wafted it under her nose. Lavender took a tentative sniff and then he saw her mouth curve into that delicious smile.   
  
“Strange. I can smell chocolate, bath oil and, oh ...” she held herself away from the bottle, but turned towards him and inhaled deeply. “And you. Blaise, is this Amortentia?”  
  
He nodded casually, but felt unbelievably relieved that she hadn’t said it smelt of Weasley ... or that arse Finnegan.  
  
“What do you smell then?” She sounded nervous.  
  
He smirked. “Leather, strawberries and ... well, it used to be the smell of your hair – at least that’s what I smelt the last time – but now ...” he watched her lips droop slightly and relented, “now it’s the smell of you when you’re ... err ... excited.” He inhaled deeply. “It’s addictive.”  
  
She blushed and he knew he’d come on too strong. He sat back and twirled a tress of her hair between his fingers, loving the silky feeling of it as it slipped through his fingers. Her breathing became faster as he trailed one finger down her back and then she was tugging at his shirt. His hands fumbled with her dress buttons but at last, he was looking at her naked body, her heavy breasts moulding into his hands. The last thing he heard her say before they were utterly lost was, “Oh, Merlin, what an escape.”  
  
Later, when they were slowly getting dressed and were removing every trace of their tryst from this place, she questioned him about Amortentia.  
  
“Why leather?”  
  
“Fine Italian leather,” he qualified. “It has a unique smell. I told you I had a house there left to me by my father.” He grinned. “My assumed father. Italian wizards know how to dress and I like that. Ginny Weasley once accused me of ‘posing’; I don’t honestly think it much of an insult. Better than dressing like a dugbog.”  
  
“Do you find her pretty?” she asked as they snuffed out the candles. Was Blaise imagining an anxious note in her voice?  
  
He shrugged. “She’s pretty enough, but she’s too ...” He waved a hand in the air, “outspoken, I suppose.”  
  
“You only like meek, compliant girls. Is that what you’re saying?”she demanded looking at him mutinously.  
  
He laughed. “Meek – you! No, that’s not what I’m saying at all. Lavender ... wait,” he pleaded as she walked towards the door. “You’re feminine. You’re popular and ... never alone. Until this year, you and your friends always seem to be having fun and that intrigued me ... because I don’t – not really.” He caught her by the waist. “You know you’re pretty – you don’t flaunt it, but you’re aware of yourself. You’re confident and that is so  _bloody_  sexy, it’s untrue.”  
  
He bent his head down and kissed her. Lavender hesitated momentarily, and then her lips parted.   
  
“I should be getting back,” she said fretfully a few minutes later.  
  
Blaise sighed. “Yeah, me too. I’m supposed to be patrolling later. Before you go...” He reached into his pocket. “Your hairclip.”  
  
She smiled warmly and as she fastened it in her hair, Blaise unlocked the door. He peered out and gestured to her that it was safe to leave.   
  
“I’m patrolling all this week, although there’s so few students it’s barely worth the effort, so I can’t see you in the evenings.” He smiled slyly. “I need my Lavender fix, even if it’s just to talk.”  
  
“Hagrid’s Hut?” she suggested. “Or perhaps Hogsmeade if I’m allowed out over the holidays.”  
  
“No doubt they’ll drop the restrictions for you, when they find out who your  _friend_  is,” said a low clear voice.  
  
Startled, Blaise turned to see Longbottom emerging from behind a pillar – his wand raised.


	5. Between the Woods and the Frozen Lake

_There they did play, dilly, dilly  
And kiss and court.  
All the fine day, dilly, dilly  
Making good sport._

  
  
Neville stepped closer, pointing his wand directly at Blaise’s throat. Lavender could see his hand twitch for his own wand, and then she stepped between them.   
  
“Neville, it’s not –”  
  
“Not what it seems, Lavender?” Neville interrupted. “I’m not stupid. Ever since the night of Hagrid’s party, I knew something was off. Dobby told me you’d got back in, but he also let slip that you were with someone. He didn’t say whom, but then Seamus mentioned Zabini pestering you. So don’t tell me there’s nothing going on!”  
  
Lavender swallowed. “I’m not going to lie to you.”   
  
Neville began edging around her, wanting a clear target; Lavender moved in step with him, but Blaise’s hand on her shoulder stopped her.   
  
“Well done, Longbottom,” he said scornfully. “You’ve sussed us out. What do you want? The Order of Merlin?”  
  
“I want to know how she can associate with Snape’s errand boy,” Neville replied darkly. He turned to Lavender. “What damage have you done? What have you told him about the D.A?”  
  
“NOTHING!” she cried as she walked towards him, arms outstretched. “Neville, I haven’t said anything. I wouldn’t do that. This is separate.”  
  
“It can’t be separate. He’s Head Boy and on the other side.”  
  
“How d’you think I knew the Carrows were coming to Hagrid’s?” she asked suddenly, her blue eyes flashing dangerously. Neville stopped looking at Blaise but didn’t lower his wand. “Blaise told me, Neville. Then, when I ran outside to warn you, he came with me.”  
  
“To save us?” Neville scoffed. “I don’t think so.”  
  
“You’re right,” said Blaise angrily as he replaced his hand on her shoulder. “I didn’t give a fuck about you – but I did care about her. You lot don’t seem to mind getting punished – seeing your friend’s skin ripped apart by hexes – but I do.”  
  
“Of course we care!” exclaimed Neville. “You think I enjoy watching others getting cursed with Cruciatus. I’ve seen what it can do to someone. I’ve seen people who will never recover.” His voice broke slightly. “So don’t say I don’t understand the consequences.”  
  
“And no doubt you have a lot to prove,” Blaise replied softly.  
  
Neville stared ahead and Lavender saw a fierce hatred flash in his eyes, although it didn’t seem to be directed at the boy in front of him for he lowered his wand. “Yes, I do,” he said simply. “But that doesn’t mean I want to put everyone else in the firing line.”  
  
Blaise traced the scar on Lavender’s cheek. “Your rebellion caused this. All you and Finnegan did was stand up – no doubt to play at being heroes and land all of you in more trouble.”  
  
“So we should just suck up like you, Zabini,” declared Neville hotly and turned to Lavender. “I didn’t see him trying to help you, Lavender.”  
  
“My sucking up, as you call it, distracted Alecto long enough ‘til the end of the lesson. She’d forgotten Lavender’s outburst as soon as I got her on the subject of Squibs.” He paused. “You, Longbottom, need to think before you act ... but I don’t expect a Gryffindor to understand that.” Blaise turned back to Lavender and squeezed her hand. “I have to get back; it’s nearly nightfall. Stay safe.”  
  
Little caring that Neville was glowering at them Lavender kissed him lightly on the lips. “Another time?” she asked in a whisper. He nodded, and then with a last gentle kiss, he left.   
  
“He’s using you, Lavender, you do realise that, don’t you?” said Neville as they both watched Blaise run towards the Dungeons.   
  
Lavender shook her head. “He won’t get anything from me, Neville.” She turned to face him, taking in the grim expression on his face. Neville had always been able to smile at things – even when he’d been the butt of the joke, Neville had seen the funny side too. But he’d changed this year... more confident ... Braver, and with a reckless streak he barely kept in check, but he didn’t laugh any more.   
  
“You don’t smile anymore, Neville,” she said, and she held out her hand to him as they began walking up the staircase to Gryffindor Tower.   
  
“Do any of us?” Neville sighed. He glanced at her outstretched hand and then accepted it. “Are you telling me he makes you smile, Lavender?”  
  
She thought of Blaise’s butterfly kisses upon her belly and her stomach muscles tautened. “He makes me forget for a while,” she replied.  
  


***

  
  
A week later the Carrows and Snape had left Hogwarts for the day, summoned, no doubt, by the Dark Lord. The students still there relished their freedom and many were outside enjoying an unusually warm spring day.   
  
By means of a note left artfully by Blaise in a book Lavender had removed from the library, she had made her way to the fifth oak tree on the edge of the Forbidden Forest for another rendezvous. She looked around but couldn’t see Blaise. Leaning against the trunk, she closed her eyes and smiled as she began to dream of delicious kisses and arms that held her close. Suddenly, she felt something drop onto her shoulder. She looked up to see a rope, but a rope that felt smooth to the touch.   
  
“Come on, Brown,” she heard Blaise’s voice from above. “Or are you Gryffindors too weak to climb trees?”  
  
“That, Zabini, is a gross slur,” she said, laughing as she wrapped the rope around her waist and clambered up. She sat on a thick bough next to him, the green oak leaves hanging like a thick curtain around the pair of them. “My dad taught me to climb trees years ago. I think he was disappointed I wasn’t a boy.”  
  
Blaise put his arm around her and kissed her mouth. “I’m bloody glad you’re not,” he murmured. Then he moved along the branch. “Come on, we need to go further up.”  
  
“Why?” she asked.  
  
He grinned. “You’ll see.”   
  
She followed him up, grazing knees and elbows on the bark, until he stopped halfway up the tree. Blaise was sitting in the middle of what looked like a wooden platform nailed into the tree.   
  
“Welcome to Zabini Mansions, Lady Lavender. Over here,” he gestured to a cushion – and Lavender smiled because it was the same one from before, “in the west wing, is the lounge. Please, make yourself comfortable, my lady.”  
  
“Did you build this?” she asked in delight as she pointed to the flooring.  
  
He nodded. “Yeah, in our second year when all the Mud – err... Muggleborns were being Petrified...” Lavender froze and he trailed off. “Sorry, I didn’t mean that. It’s a bad habit.” He took her hand. “A  _very_  bad habit.”  
  
Lavender stared at him, suddenly unsure why she was here. He increased the pressure on her hand and stared back, but she removed her hand.   
  
“Sorry,” he said again, sounding sincere.  
  
“Is that what you really think of Muggleborns?” she asked bleakly. “That they have dirty blood?”  
  
“No, I don’t,” he exclaimed. “Please, Lavender, it slipped out. It’s just a word. I know it’s a horrible word and I know it’s wrong to use it.”  
  
“It’s not just you  _using_  it, Blaise. It’s why you do.” She moved further away from him, trying to decide whether to leave.   
  
“What do you think of when you think of Slytherin?” Blaise said suddenly. “Tell me, honestly, the words that come into your mind when you think of my House.”  
  
Lavender looked at him. There was an achingly long silence and then she said harshly, “Dark wizards. Evil bastards. You-know-Who.  _That’s_  what I think of.” She paused. “It’s not the same, Blaise.”  
  
Blaise shuffled towards her and lightly touched her arm. “I know that, but it’s still a judgement isn’t it? It’s still you thinking and speaking opinions you’ve heard over and over again. Do you think I’m evil?”  
  
She shook her head and Blaise clasped her hand in his. “I’ve had eighteen years and countless stepfathers spewing filth at me about Muggleborns. I don’t believe it, really I don’t.”  
  
“Was it finding out about your real dad that changed your mind?” she asked in a gentler tone than before. Blaise put his arm around her and drew her close.   
  
“Partly, but I was already uneasy.” He gestured to the tree and the planks he’d hammered into the trunks. “I built this shortly after Finch-Fletchley was Petrified. The whole school were convinced that Slytherins were behind it, and I wanted to get away from all that hatred.” He laughed, mirthlessly. “We used to have Charms with the Hufflepuffs and I quite liked Justin. I know I wasn’t supposed to, but he was so happy to be here, to be a wizard and it made me smile.”  
  
Lavender squeezed his hand and gave him a small peck on the cheek. Blaise heaved a sigh of relief and kissed her lightly on the mouth. “So is Longbottom still giving you a hard time?”  
  
“Not really,” she replied wearily. “He’s worried and keeps saying you can’t be trusted, but he can’t exactly stop me, can he?”  
  
“He’s right not to trust me.” Lavender looked up in alarm. “I’m being realistic here. I don’t know how I’d react if I were tortured, or if someone I cared about was being threatened.” He paused and smoothed a tress of her hair behind her ear. “Just don’t tell me anything you don’t want Snape to know. Malfoy’s told me he’s an extremely good Legilimans and my Occlumency skills aren’t  _that_  good.”  
  
“You studied Occlumency?” Lavender asked in surprise. “Who taught you?”  
  
“My mother,” he answered simply. “If you think I’m secretive, you should see her.”  
  
“Are you close?”  
  
Blaise shrugged. “As close as anyone can get to her, I suppose. We argue over careers and stuff. She thinks I should just get a good job at the Ministry using her connections. ”  
  
Lavender shifted herself towards him. “But you want to do something else?”  
  
Blaise lay down and looked up at the vast canopy of leaves overhead. “I’d quite like to teach, actually,” he admitted quietly. “Or be an Apothecary. I like Potions – as you’ve probably guessed.” He turned onto his side as she lay down next to him. “What about you?”  
  
“I don’t think that far ahead,” she said bleakly. “When I was little, I wanted to make fine robes for famous witches ... but now ...it seems meaningless.”  
  
“People always want clothes,” said Blaise as he brushed off an invisible speck of dirt from his trousers. “My mother, for instance, rarely wears the same dress robes twice.” He smiled at something, a memory perhaps. “You want to know if she murdered all her husbands, don’t you?”   
  
Lavender gasped and then blushed. “You’re a Legilimans too?”   
  
“Nope,” he replied and grimaced. “It’s what everyone wants to know after a while.” He picked an oak leaf out of her hair, twirling it between his finger and thumb. “If you’d asked me a year ago – maybe more – I’d have stoutly defended her. She married seven older men, all rich, and all died of natural causes. No one was able to prove anything, and believe me her fourth husband’s family were very powerful and tried to discredit her.”  
  
“What do you think now, though?” Lavender asked, aware that Blaise had stopped moving.  
  
“Now,” he said after a while, “I don’t know. The pureblood father is a lie, and I’m not sure what to believe. She’s very beautiful, you know.”  
  
Lavender nodded.  
  
“And manipulative – especially with the opposite sex.” He stretched out his hand and began to run it up Lavender’s back resting his fingers on the nape of her neck. “That’s hereditary,” he murmured.   
  
Lavender blushed again. “Do you have any brothers and sisters?”   
  
“Nope, she was careful there. She didn’t mean to have me, but perhaps she’ll have some with Flint; he’ll be after an heir, I should think, and she’s young enough.”   
  
Blaise lay back down on the cushion and pulled Lavender on top of him. He moved closer for a kiss but she stopped him with her fingertips.   
  
“What would she think of you being with me?”  
  
Blaise sighed in exasperation. “She wants me to marry well – I don’t mean a pureblood necessarily -- just someone with money and influence. She’d label you a gold-digger, conveniently forgetting her past, but be most annoyed that we’re being so reckless.”  
  
“Reckless?”  
  
“Oh, come on, Lavender. We weren’t exactly careful that first time ... you could be pregnant now.”  
  
She laughed. “I’m not pregnant, Blaise. Your mum doesn’t need to worry.” She smiled at the relief that washed over his face, and then gasped as his hand slowly moved up her leg and to her thigh, his fingers slipping underneath her pants. “We can’t do this in a tree,” she protested, but very faintly as she struggled to concentrate on something other than his lips moving down from her neck.   
  
“Wanna bet?” he murmured.  
  


***

  
  
“You win,” she said later.   
  
Blaise laughed, but she didn’t join in. The sun had gone behind a cloud now, and their golden afternoon was drawing to a close.   
  
“What’s the matter?” he asked as he stroked her hair.   
  
Lavender moved away from his caress. “Is this wrong?”  
  
“What sex in a tree or sex in general?”  
  
“I mean the fact that while we’re doing this, others are being tortured ... or dying.” She sat up and drew her knees to her chest. “We lost Luna at Christmas. No one has any idea where she is – Neville thinks Azkaban.” She broke off unable to bear thinking about Luna facing Dementors.  
  
Blaise drew her to him. “Perhaps that just means we should live for the moment,” he muttered.  
  
A light breeze fluttered though the leaves, Blaise draped his cloak over her shoulders and they sat watching the sun through the boughs of the tree as it climbed down the sky.   
  
“They’ll be back soon, won’t they?” she said after a while and sighed. “We should go.”  
  
He nodded, looking equally despondent and then reluctantly reached for the rope. He climbed down and then waited for her to land at his feet. Looking down at her, he kissed her lingeringly on the mouth and then pushed her gently away. “You go now, and I’ll follow in a few minutes.”  
  
Lavender wandered back aimlessly. She had no wish to return to Neville’s disapproval because he was bound to subject her to another lecture. She wondered if he’d tell everyone about Blaise and what their reactions would be. Ginny would rage at her, Parvati would argue and Seamus ... she sighed ... Seamus would be disgusted.   
  
She remembered again those first few weeks when she’d refused to rejoin the DA. She’d been on the outside for the first time ever at Hogwarts, but at least Parvati had been friendly. If Neville spilled the beans she’d have no one ... except Blaise, and she wasn’t sure all the secret trysts in the world would make up for losing her friends.   
  
As she approached the lake, she saw the sun’s rays illuminating the ripples on the surface. The Carrows were clearly not back yet because around her the pupils had gathered and were splashing in the shallows. It reminded her of happier times when she’d walked here with Parvati, or talked with Ron. Then she laughed. She and Ron had never talked – not unless it was about Quidditch and she was praising his Keeping skills. Then her thoughts returned to Blaise and the feelings he aroused in her. Was it foolhardy to dream of a happy-ever-after?   
  
 _Lavender Zabini,_  she thought idly.  _Mr and Mrs Blaise Zabini. Lavender Brown-Zabini._  
  
Then she shook her head violently. “Stop it!” she said angrily to herself. “Stop dreaming up stupid fairy tales. It’s a fling, nothing more.”  
  
“Lavender.” She heard a shout and looked up to see Neville running towards her. “Where have you been?”  
  
“Nowhere particularly,” she replied and braced herself for his reproof. However, Neville was smiling, not just smiling, he was grinning broadly and laughing.   
  
“You’ve got news,” she gasped.  
  
“I’ve just heard from Ginny. She’s in hiding with her family and not coming back, but ...” His face cracked into a huge smile again. “Harry’s alive. He, Ron and Hermione are with her brother and ... Oh, Merlin ... Lavender, they’ve rescued Luna and Dean. They’re safe and well.”  
  
She could not stop from laughing, from pulling Neville into a huge embrace and then turning her face to the sky and screaming, “Yes!”  
  
In the distance, she saw Blaise walking towards the castle ... but this was not about him or their relationship. This was Lavender, Neville and Dumbledore’s Army marching forwards.   
  


***

  
  
They spent their evening giggling together in the common room. Professor McGonagall had advised them both to sleep but both were too buoyed up with hope to heed her.   
  
“Will they come here?” Lavender asked him.   
  
“They’re bound to. They must see that throwing out Snape and the Carrows is important.” Neville cracked open two bottles of Butterbeer. “Sorry, I don’t have anything stronger.”  
  
She grinned as she took the bottle. “I don’t need anything stronger, Nev. Tonight’s news is the best we’ve had for ages. Did you tell the others?”  
  
He nodded. “I got Seamus straight away. I can’t wait to see him; he must be so relieved about Dean. Parvati and Padma know – she’ll tell the Ravenclaws, and Hannah ...” he blushed slightly. “... I was talking to her when the message came, so she knows.”  
  
“Neville, you dark horse. What were you doing with Miss Abbot?”  
  
He grinned even more. “Just talking, but when the news came in, she ... err ... kissed me.”  
  
“I hope you responded, Mr Longbottom,” replied Lavender and with an accurate imitation of their Head of House she continued, “It would be most  _ungallant_  of you not to return the young lady’s favour.”  
  
Neville reclined on the sofa and kicked off his shoes. “Oh, I return it, Professor Brown.”   
  
He closed his eyes and Lavender ruffled his hair. “Go get her, Neville. Live for the moment,” she whispered. She sat back in her chair and swigged at her bottle. Neville and Hannah would have everyone’s blessing whereas her and Blaise ... She sighed and wished she had something stronger than Butterbeer.   
  
“Tell me about Zabini, then.” Lavender looked across at Neville. He still had his eyes closed. She didn’t speak but drank some more Butterbeer. “I’m not going to lecture you, Lavender. I just want to understand.”  
  
“Oh,” she said. She could feel tears welling in her eyes. “I don’t really understand myself, but he saved me from something and – ”   
  
Neville sat up, serious again. “You feel obligated, is that it?”  
  
She pulled her knees up to her chest and smiled. “No, it’s gone way beyond that. Perhaps in the beginning, but now he’s like a ...” she searched for the words “...a spark of warmth in all this cold. That sounds lame, I know, but we spend so much time fighting, planning and living with the knowledge that we could die and Blaise just helps me through.” She reached across and grasped Neville’s hand. “I don’t expect you understand, and I know you don’t approve, but please,  _please_ , can you keep this to yourself?”  
  
Neville looked at her then very slowly nodded. She squeezed his hand again.   
  
“Do you honestly trust him, Lavender?”   
  
She thought a while before replying. “With  _my_  life? As far as I can any of you, but I wouldn’t risk anyone else’s and he’s told me as much.”  
  
“Will you use him to help us?”  
  
Lavender finished her drink and placed it carefully on the table. “No,” she said finally. “I won’t put him in that position.”  
  


***

  
  
“Whoa, look at Malfoy,” said Parvati two days later. The students had returned after Easter and were having breakfast. Although Ginny’s absence was as glaring as a missing front tooth, none of the teachers had remarked upon it. Lavender turned her head and saw Draco skulk in to sit between Pansy and Blaise. Pansy was running her fingers through his hair but he winced as she touched a large bruise on his face. Lavender turned her face briefly towards Blaise and flashed him a smile. He twitched one corner of his mouth upwards and then turned towards Crabbe who’d asked him something.   
  
“He looks like us after detention,” she remarked. “Probably not had the greatest Easter holiday.”  
  
“Hopefully, that means things are going very badly at Malfoy Manor,” whispered Neville.   
  
“Well, if Amycus cranks up the punishments, we’ll know,” said Seamus who was reaching for his fourth slice of toast. Parvati tutted at him. “I need to build up my strength,” he protested. “We’ve got Muggle Studies first thing and I’m bound to be in detention after that.”  
  
“What are you planning?” asked Lavender suspiciously, as she noticed a grin pass between Neville and Seamus.  
  
Seamus tapped his nose. “Ask no questions, I’ll tell no lies. It’s just something me mam told me when I was at home.”  
  
With a strong sense of foreboding, Lavender entered the Muggle Studies classroom. Sitting with Parvati, they kept two seats free for Neville and Seamus but they sat two rows in front. Neville turned around. “Don’t get involved, okay?”  
  
Parvati frowned. “That’s all very well,” she muttered to Lavender. “I just hope no one else wants to sit next to us.”  
  
Both girls turned their heads to see the Slytherins enter. In horror, Lavender saw Crabbe and Goyle walk towards the empty seats. Malfoy, accompanied by a smirking Pansy, wandered sullenly to the back.  
  
“Hey, Crabbe, Goyle, there’s space here,” Blaise’s voice rang across the classroom. Lavender saw Goyle turn back but Crabbe carried on. She swallowed.   
  
“Daughter of a Mudblood,” Pansy called. “Don’t know what you could catch.”  
  
Crabbe hesitated and as he did so, the last of the Slytherin girls walked in. Tabitha made a beeline for Blaise and Lavender laughed to herself as she saw him suppress a grimace. Daphne, however, walked determinedly forward with Millicent and took the two seats.  
  
“You don’t mind, do you?” Daphne murmured. “I’d rather not watch Tabitha smarming all over Blaise and Goyle makes my skin crawl.”  
  
“Err ... of course not,” Parvati replied.   
  
Alecto Carrow swept into the classroom. “Ah, my year sevens, how nice to see you back. I trust you all had an excellent Easter break.”  
  
“Well, mine was certainly better that Malfoys, by the look of it,” catcalled Seamus from the front row.   
  
Pansy’s wand was out in an instant but Alecto was faster. Viciously she slapped Seamus across the face, her ring slicing open his cheek. Lavender winced and saw Parvati shaking with anger.   
  
“Stupid boy,” hissed Alecto. “But what can I possibly expect from something as low as you.”  
  
“What do you mean by that?” asked Seamus. He didn’t sound subdued but confident and cocky like he used to.  
  
“Your mother married a Muggle,” retorted Alecto. “It was a stupid thing to do.”  
  
Seamus stood up. “Me mam told me something this holiday, Professor. She remembers you from school. She tells me that when your parents used to meet you and your brother at King’s Cross, they had a small girl with them.”  
  
“Shut up!” screamed Alecto. Her face was going purple with rage. She held out her wand but was shaking so much that her hex went wide.   
  
Neville leapt up, standing in front of Seamus. “Go on, this is interesting.”  
  
“A sister, she told me. Called Allegra, or something,” Seamus continued. He turned to the class grinning broadly. “Here’s the funny thing, Allegra Carrow never came to Hogwarts, Neville. Do you know why?”  
  
“She died!” shouted Alecto.   
  
“There’s no record of her death, Professor,” replied Seamus. “I know, ‘cause I checked.”  
  
The class was silent. Lavender was scarcely aware of anyone except Seamus. Next to her Parvati was clutching her wand and Daphne was staring at the floor. She glanced back at Blaise who was sitting very, very still. His eyes flickered towards her and she saw a desperate entreaty in his eyes. She nodded slightly and saw him let out a sigh.   
  
“So,” Seamus was continuing. “If she never came to Hogwarts and isn’t dead, that must mean she’s a SQUIB.”  
  
At that, Alecto finally reacted. She aimed a Stinging jinx at Seamus, and then she swung her arm back. “Crucio!” she cried, just as Neville knocked her off balance. The curse hit Seamus and he fell to the floor. Goyle pulled back his chair and started to run forward. Lavender gasped as he went sprawling to the ground, caught by a trip jinx. Blaise leant back in his chair, seemingly bored by the chaos around him, but Lavender had seen his wand flick towards Goyle and by the look on Daphne’s face, she had too.  
  
“How much Muggle blood do you have in you then, Alecto?” yelled Neville as he faced her. “Squibs are a sign of a Muggle ancestor somewhere, aren’t they?”  
  
Alecto turned from Seamus’ quivering form on the floor and rounded on Neville. “You will pay, blood-traitor scum!” She hexed him straight in the face and his lip split open.   
  
Parvati shrieked in horror as Alecto turned her wand on the two Gryffindor girls.   
  
And Lavender knew that it didn’t matter that her and Parvati had not been involved. They were Gryffindors and so would pay for Seamus and Neville’s words.  
  
“Professor Carrow,” Daphne spoke for the first time. Alecto’s eyes flickered briefly to the Slytherin girl.   
  
“What?” she asked sharply. “If this is a ploy to distract me, then your Slytherin skin won’t spare you, Miss Greengrass.”  
  
Daphne held her gaze. “No, Professor. I was just informing you that the Headmaster is here.”  
  
Alecto looked up from Daphne’s face and the class followed her gaze. Snape sat at the back behind Nott.   
  
“Just observing how you keep order, Professor Carrow,” he said coldly. “In my years as a teacher, I rarely had to resort to  _quite_  so much violence, whatever the provocation. Longbottom can be infuriating, I agree, but drawing blood isn’t always the answer.”  
  
He stood up. “Class dismissed. Professor Carrow, I need to speak to you on another matter in my study.” His eyes lingered on Seamus who was lying on the floor, barely moving. “Somewhat reminiscent of Potter at his most arrogant, Finnegan. Not clever in the slightest.”  
  
As Snape left accompanied by Alecto, Lavender ran forward to help Seamus. She was vaguely aware of Pansy making threatening remarks and heard Blaise tell them all in a bored tone that it wasn’t every day they had a free morning and perhaps they should make the most of it in the common room.   
  
Although she was cradling Seamus in her arms, she looked up as Blaise left the classroom to convey her gratitude, but he looked detached and uninterested. A groan from Seamus brought her back to reality.  
  
“Reminiscent of Potter, eh” he whispered. “I must be doing something right.”


	6. Restrictions

_Let the birds sing, dilly, dilly, And the lambs play,  
We shall be safe, dilly, dilly, Out of harm's way._

  
  
  
“It’s at times like these, that I really wish Hermione was here,” said Lavender the next evening. She was sitting with Seamus in the common room and dabbing ineffectually at the gash on his cheek. His face was swollen to unrecognisable proportions, but although in immense pain, he’d been denied permission to seek treatment.   
  
“Why Hermione?” he croaked.   
  
“Because she knew all sorts of remedies. I remember after I got burnt by one of those horrible Skrewt things, she pulled out something from her trunk, and I didn’t have to see Madam Pomfrey at all.”  
  
“I thought you hated Hermione ... after all that palarver with Ron.”  
  
Lavender sighed. “I was jealous of her, but it was never hate. Anyway, that was another life.”   
She dabbed again at his cheek.   
  
“So, you’re not still pining for Ron, then?”  
  
“Merlin, no!” Lavender laughed. “Ancient history, Seamus.”  
  
His hand closed around hers. “Talking of history, Lavender…” He paused and after glancing at her, he looked away. Taking a deep breath, Seamus continued, “Is there any chance you’d go back out with me?” Lavender opened her mouth to speak but he carried on, talking quickly, willing her not to speak. Looking her in the eye, he continued, “I’m not the immature arse who took you to the Yule Ball, got you one drink then spent all evening talking to Dean. What do you say?”   
  
Gently, Lavender removed her hand from his. She gazed into his warm, friendly eyes, but the image of Blaise’s dark, liquid eyes swam before her. “Sorry, Seamus. You’re a good friend but ...”  
  
“Yeah, stupid mistake. Forget I said anything,” he replied, his voice shaking slightly. He stood up. “I think I’ll have an early night.”  
  
“Good idea,” she said hurriedly. “I will too, once I’ve returned this Transfiguration book.”  
  
Seamus yawned. “Can’t it wait ‘til morning?”  
  
“No, Madame Pince will be after blood if I keep it out for another hour.”  
  


***

  
  
Madam Pince barely looked up when she walked in. Lavender waved her signed permission slip from Professor McGonagall under her nose. The librarian glanced at the book and the note, grunted something and pointed to the Restricted Section. Smiling, Lavender walked through the maze of shelves until she reached the far corner of the library. Stepping over the ropes, which separated this section from the rest of the library, Lavender caught her breath as an arm crept round her waist.   
  
“You took your time,” murmured Blaise as he nuzzled her neck. The familiar sensation of lust began to seep through her as he kissed her.  
  
“Sorry,” she whispered.   
  
“Problems?” he asked as he turned her around to face him. He started to run one hand slowly up her back, kissing her gently on the jaw line and down her neck.   
  
“Not really,” she breathed. “I was just looking after Seamus.”   
  
Blaise’s hand froze in the middle of her back, and he pulled away slightly. “Why?” he asked, and Lavender was surprised to hear an edge to his voice. He took a breath and asked in a more reasonable tone, “What’s wrong with him?”  
  
“Blaise, you saw what Alecto did to him and she won’t let him go to Madam Pomfrey. There’s not a great deal I can do with a flannel and lukewarm water.” She stared into his eyes. “What’s the matter?”  
  
Blaise looked away. “Finnegan likes you,” he said at last. “I see it every time he looks at you, and ...”  
  
Lavender placed a finger on his lips. “I know he does,” she whispered, “but I’m not interested. He’s just a friend.” She pulled his head down to hers and kissed him softly on the lips, but Blaise didn’t respond. Starting to get annoyed, she continued archly, “If I wanted to be with Seamus, I’d hardly be sneaking around in the Restricted Section of the library to be with  _you,_  would I? It would be far more convenient and much safer to stay in my common room, for Merlin’s sake!”  
  
Lavender let her hands drop to her sides and pulled away. “I could mention Tabitha Flint here ... everyone’s seen how she trails round after you.”  
  
“Tabitha!” Blaise sounded shocked, and then he laughed. He pulled Lavender close to him. “Why the hell would I be interested in that brainless bint?”   
  
“Err, she’s pretty, she’s slim, she’s a Slytherin and she fancies you,” replied Lavender waspishly as she ticked off reasons on her fingers.   
  
  
Blaise snorted. “Scrawny—not slim. Pretty?” He tilted his head to one side, considering. “She’s all right I suppose, but ...” he ran his fingers along the nape of Lavender’s neck, “... you’re prettier. As for being a Slytherin, you should know by now that I don’t give a fuck about all that crap.” He smirked slightly and lowered his mouth to the side of her neck, “It would,” he whispered, “be far safer if we were in our own common rooms ... but it wouldn’t be this much fun.”   
  
Lavender smiled and began to kiss him back. “Is this my cautious Slytherin speaking?”  
  
“Stop taking the piss,” he muttered, “and close your eyes.”  
  
Lavender giggled but then complied. Blaise’s hand left her neck and she could hear a rustling, but she kept her eyes closed. “What are you doing?” she asked.  
  
“Shh, Pince will hear you,” he murmured.   
  
Then she felt something on her lips. It was warm, soft and enticing. The smell entranced her and before she could stop herself, Lavender had stuck out her tongue. “Chocolate,” she whispered and smiled widely.  
  
“Honeydukes finest,” Blaise replied as he traced his chocolate laden finger over her lips. “It’s called Pourable Paradise; I saw it and thought of you.”   
  
Her tongue began to chase his finger as he teased her. “More,” she moaned softly. Blaise pulled her to the floor and held out a small iridescent jar. Lavender could see the chocolate inside, and it seemed to be bubbling. There was a gold sheen across the surface and as she dipped her finger in, she could feel the silken texture as it dripped off her finger. “Ohh, Merlin, that’s good.”  
  
Blaise laughed. “No wonder you smelt this in Amortentia. I’ve never seen you quite so ...” he paused, “... quite so aroused -- well, not by food.”   
  
“I haven’t had Honeydukes chocolate since I went home at Christmas, that’s why, Zabini,” she protested, slightly irritably. Blaise started to put the lid back on the jar but she dipped her finger in again. “I haven’t been allowed into Hogsmeade at all, and you must have noticed our treat parcels from home have been confiscated.”   
  
She lifted her finger to her mouth but Blaise dipped his head down and began to lick the chocolate off. Then he moved to her mouth, bestowing feather kisses on her lips, her cheekbone, her jaw and her neck. His arms moved down her body and she felt one hand slip under robe. It stopped.   
  
“Merlin! Are you wearing anything under this robe?”  
  
“Not much,” she replied and gasped as his hand moved swiftly up her bare leg and touched her thigh. He hesitated and then crept up further until he could feel the delicate lace of her pants. His thumb slipped underneath and she cried out, but Blaise leant into her and kissed her firmly on the mouth.   
  
She was arching towards him, barely able to think of anything else except his mouth on her neck and his fingers slipping over her. “We can’t do this here; Pince will hear us.”  
  
“Not if you’re quiet,” he murmured. Pulling her up and into a small alcove in the corner, Blaise lifted her onto a ledge and knelt before her. She could feel his warm breath, and then he hoisted her robe above her waist and slid her pants to the floor. He began to kiss every inch of her thighs, stopping only when he reached the top. Lavender pushed herself towards him and moaned softly as she gave in to wave upon wave of pleasure.   
  
Then, as she hooked her legs around his waist, she watched his face in the candlelight contort in pleasure as he shuddered towards a climax, “Hush,” she teased. “She’ll hear us.”   
  
But Blaise was beyond her words and Lavender laughed for she was sure Madam Pince had long gone.  
  
“Bloody hell,” he said finally as his breathing returned to normal. He leant against her, his forehead touching hers. “I should bring you chocolate more often. This just gets better and better.”  
  
“The chocolate’s just a bonus,” she whispered and giggled. “What do you think Madam Pince would be most furious about - the chocolate  _defiling_  her books, or us  _defiling_  her library?”  
  
Blaise chuckled softly. “I think she’d have been so apoplectic at the chocolate, she wouldn’t have seen what else we were doing.” He closed his eyes and gently pressed his lips to her brow. Lavender could feel his heart slowing now, and as he pulled away slightly, she levered herself down to the floor. Blaise sat down and pulled her into him. “About earlier,” he began. “I was jealous, sorry.”  
  
Lavender smiled and pecked him on the cheek. “That’s sweet, but there’s no reason to be jealous. Seamus and I went out years ago, but that’s all in the past. I promise.”  
  
“When did you go out together?” Blaise asked casually. He was stroking her hair and kissing her softly on the ear. Lavender leant back into him.  
  
“I went to the Yule Ball with him, and we went out a bit before and after then, that’s all,” she replied, adding impishly, “I don’t expect you to remember; you were otherwise occupied that night.”  
  
“Merlin, how do you remember that?” Blaise asked in shock. He shifted her around in his arms and looked into her face. Lavender laughed.   
  
“Blaise Zabini going to the Yule Ball with a girl two years older and from Ravenclaw. It wasn’t quite as big news as Hermione hooking up with Viktor Krum, but you and Emma Zeller? Of course we were going to gossip.”  
  
Blaise scowled. “Glad I was able to amuse you,” he said, a touch coldly. “I didn’t realise we were so mismatched.”   
  
Lavender shook her head and touched his hand. “No, no, I didn’t mean that ... not at all. Parvati, Padma and I couldn’t work out why you’d chosen to go with her, that’s all. I mean, she was pretty, but not in the same House or even the same year.” She paused. “I think that’s when I first really noticed you because you looked absolutely gorgeous that night.”  
  
The scowl left his face. “The truth is that she asked me,” he explained and grinned slightly. “I hadn’t got a partner, didn’t even want to go, but suddenly this sixth year girl ambushed me as I was walking to Charms and –” He stopped. “Well, let’s just say, my choices among the Slytherins were limited to Millicent or Millicent. The only boys the girls in my House wanted to be seen with were the ones from Durmstrang.”  
  
“Was it just one date?” Lavender asked, trying to sound as if the answer was of no real importance.  
  
Blaise wasn’t fooled and flipped her nose with his finger. “Now who sounds jealous?” He smirked. “I had a few snogs with her, she was ... instructive ... let’s put it that way, but it didn’t last much beyond a term.” Lavender could see him smothering a yawn. He massaged the bridge of his nose with one hand. “Sorry, I’m knackered. You, Lady Lavender, have exhausted me.”  
  
Lavender stood up. “We should be getting back, I suppose,” she said reluctantly.  
  
Blaise stretched as he stood up, yawned again and then pulled her into his arms. “I wanted to talk to you about something,” he said.   
  
Lavender waited as he gathered his thoughts. Around her, she could hear the rustling and whispering of the Restricted Section books. She’d never liked this area and if she’d had to take a book out, she’d always come with Parvati or Ron. But here, with Blaise, she didn’t feel uneasy or fearful, or any of the things she usually felt.   
  
Blaise trailed a fingertip down her cheek. “We only have a term left here, Lavender...”  
  
She nodded and swallowed, unwilling to think of a future beyond school, because no one had any idea what this new order’s plans were for witches such as her.   
  
“When I leave Hogwarts,” he said after a short pause, “I want to go abroad for a while. I’ve decided I don’t care what my mum wants, I want to travel a bit ... escape for a while.”  
  
“Oh,” Lavender said inadequately. Her stomach seemed leaden and she felt as if the outside world were closing in on her. She hadn’t thought beyond Hogwarts, but suddenly she could see how bleak her future was without her haven.  
  
“Come with me,” he said simply as he cupped her face in his hands. “I don’t know what will happen to us away from here, but you’ll be safer abroad. You don’t have to stay with me, but I’d like... Oh, shit what’s the matter?” He stopped, appalled at the tears running down her cheeks.   
  
Lavender entwined her arms around his neck and held him tight. “Thank you,” she said and sniffed loudly. Then she broke into a smile. “I’d love to, Blaise, really, I’d love to.”   
  


***

  
  
A great cheer from the Gryffindor common room woke Lavender the next morning. She frowned and tried to get back to sleep, but Parvati was curious and dragged her down the stairs.   
  
Neville was standing by the hearth, a letter in his hand and a huge smile on his face. “My gran!” he exclaimed. “The Ministry tried to get her carted off to Azkaban.”  
  
Lavender yelped, but Neville was still smiling. “Should never underestimate my gran. She may be old, but she’s a fighter. There’s an Auror in hospital and she’s on the run.” He roared with utter joy. “They thought they could grab her to shut me up, but they’ve failed. My gran says she’s proud of me, that we’ve got to carry on fighting and ...” Lavender saw a tear in his eye “... that I’m truly my father’s son.”   
  
Lavender and Parvati embraced him warmly while Seamus thumped him on the back.   
  
“I don’t care how many Cruciatus curses they cast at me in detention tonight,” said Neville. “I won’t be able to stop smiling.”  
  


***

  
  
Blaise woke late long after breakfast had started, but he didn’t hurry to get up. He’d lain awake most of the night thinking of Lavender, and the enormity of what he’d asked her last night.   
  
 _It’s not like I asked her to marry me,_  he thought. But her response to his question, her real enthusiasm had unnerved him almost as much as the pleasure it had evoked in him. He didn’t want to care this much about someone. He’d been able to fool himself even after that first time, that it was merely lust he felt, and enjoyment in her body. Sharing his life with someone scared him ... yet he felt excited and he knew it was the best way to keep her safe.   
  
He was different when he was with her -- he knew that -- unrecognisable from the aloof boy who had no real friends because he’d never wanted them. Her popularity had intrigued him, and then held him captive. It was if she was the missing part of the whole he never realised he needed to be. His stomach rumbled and grudgingly he got up.   
  
“What’s Longbottom so pleased about, Theodore?” he asked as he sat down for a late breakfast. Nott followed his gaze to the Gryffindor table.   
  
“Not sure,” Nott replied in his cautious manner. “Malfoy said something about Longbottom’s grandmother being taken in for questioning yesterday. Why that would make him happy, I don’t know.”  
  
“Unless she escaped,” mused Blaise, more to himself than to his companion.  
  
“You sound almost hopeful.” Nott poured himself a cup of tea and added half a teaspoon of sugar. Blaise watched in amusement as he stirred it three times clockwise and three times the other way.   
  
“I don’t see what harm his old nan can do to the Ministry, do you?”  
  
“It is not our place to question the Carrows,” replied Nott, sipping fastidiously .   
  
“The Carrows?” Blaise turned his head away from Lavender, who was laughing at something Longbottom was saying.  
  
“Oh yes,” replied Nott, with a touch of smugness. “Malfoy said it was at the Carrow’s instigation.”  
  
Blaise looked across at the teachers’ table. Professor McGonagall was looking anxiously at Longbottom who was still making Lavender laugh. Alecto and Amycus were talking in whispers and casting malevolent glares at the Gryffindors.   
  
“Oh, Blaise,” Nott said as he carefully buttered some toast. “Professor Snape was looking for you.”  
  
Blaise rose to his feet. “I’d better not keep him waiting then.”  
  
Hurriedly, he made his way to the headmaster’s office. The door was slightly ajar and he could hear Snape once again talking to Professor Dumbledore.   
  
“They sent Dawlish, that idiot you Confunded two years ago and Augusta Longbottom proved too much for him.”  
  
“You sound as if you approve, Severus.”  
  
“I despise incompetence, Dumbledore, you know that. If they want Longbottom, then they should have stopped him – not his grandmother.  _She_  can fight, whereas her grandson is ineffectual without his team behind him.”  
  
“No doubt they’ll stop him now.”  
  
“Mmm.” Snape sounded bored. “I believe Amycus will dispose of him once Minerva’s out of the way. She has a class at ten o’clock.”  
  
Blaise swallowed hard. Not caring that Snape wished to see him, he ran fast, away from the office, down five flights of stairs and back to the Great Hall. Wildly, he scanned the Gryffindor table. Some first years were still there, but Lavender and Neville had gone.   
  
“Fuck, fuck, fuck!” he muttered, and turning his head he raced back up the stairs trying to remember which way Lavender had turned when he’d watched her leave the library last night. After reaching another dead end, Blaise banged his head against the wall in frustration.   
  
“Wouldn’t do that, Blousy. You might knock all your brains out – and you haven’t got any to spare.”  
  
Blaise looked up to see Peeves drifting aimlessly overhead.   
  
“P-peeves,” he spluttered. “Which way to Gryffindor Tower?”  
  
“Peevesy can’t tell you that. You’re a slimy Slytherin.”  
  
Blaise felt a surge of irritation course through his body. “It’s important!”  
  
Peeves chuckled and zoomed around in circles lazily blowing raspberries. “Does Blousy want to see his Lavy? That’s not important.”  
  
“No, that’s not what I want!” yelled Blaise as he tried to grab futilely at the poltergeist. He did a double take. “Wait, how do you know about that?”  
  
“You’d be surprised at the things Peeves sees, Blousy, especially in the library.”  
  
Blaise shook his head, trying to clear the image in his head of Peeves spying on him and Lavender. However, now was not the time to rail at the poltergeist. “Peeves, please, it’s very important and has nothing to do with Lavy ... err... Miss Brown. I have to speak to Longbottom ... now.  
  
Peeves floated around in the air for a while, humming. Blaise felt himself shaking with frustration. It was nearly ten o’clock and he knew Longbottom was running out of time. He walked off to the right.   
  
“Wrong!” cackled Peeves. “You want left then first right.” He flew off in the opposite direction and Blaise could hear his malevolent laughter floating back to him.   
  
Desperately hoping that Peeves hadn’t fed him a line, Blaise began running again. Just as he turned right, he collided with someone. To his utter relief it was Lavender and Longbottom.   
  
“I’ll leave you alone,” said Neville frostily, “but the others are on their way so–”  
  
“Shut up!” Blaise hissed. “I’m here for you, Longbottom. I heard all about your grandmother escaping, but you know this means they’re after you now.”  
  
“What?” Lavender’s eyes widened in horror.   
  
Neville looked only mildly concerned. “Few more detentions. So what?”  
  
Blaise seized him by the lapels of his robe and shoved him against the wall. “Not detention, you prat. I heard Snape say that Amycus plans to ‘dispose’ of you. I doubt you’ll even make it to Azkaban.”  
  
Lavender clutched at Neville’s arm. “You’ve got to leave, Neville.”   
  
“The whole castle is guarded and I don’t know how you’ll get out ... unless you hide in the kitchens for a while and then make a run for it,” Blaise said urgently. He loosened his hold on Longbottom and stepped back. “It’s risky but I don’t see you have any other choice.” Closing his eyes, Blaise could see two paths in his mind. He glanced at Lavender, seeing the fear in her face. “I’ll lead a false trail if you want, tell them I saw you in the Forbidden Forest or something.”  
  
Neville smiled grimly and stared directly at Blaise. “Thanks, but I’m not leaving Hogwarts.” Gently, he removed Lavender’s hand from his arm and whispered, “Our old meeting place – yeah. Tell the others.”  
  
Lavender nodded and kissed him fleetingly on the cheek. “Dumbledore’s Army!” she whispered fiercely. Neville hugged her briefly and then began to run.   
  
“I won’t ask what that was about,” muttered Blaise. He squeezed her on the shoulder. “I have to get back; I should be with Snape.”  
  
He heard Parvati’s voice from around the corner and blowing Lavender a kiss, he ran back the way he’d come.   
  


***

  
  
Taking several large gulps of air to slow his heart rate, Blaise smoothed down his robes and approached Snape’s office. He knocked respectfully and heard a voice telling him to enter.   
  
It wasn’t Snape who bid him enter; Snape wasn’t there, rather, the imposing portrait of his predecessor that hung above the desk.   
  
“Oh, Professor Dumbledore, sir, I was looking for the headmaster.”  
  
“He is out, I believe, Mr Zabini. What do you wish to see him about?” Dumbledore asked casually. “I could always pass on a message.”  
  
The idea that Professor Dumbledore was now merely a secretary amused yet also saddened Blaise. He’d recognised a certain detached quality in his former headmaster that he also possessed and although they’d never been close, and had not had any particular conversations of note, Blaise had been truly sorry when the great wizard had died.   
  
“He wanted to see me about something, sir,” Blaise replied.   
  
“Yes, he did want to see you earlier, so why didn’t you come in before?” His eyes twinkled. “I saw you standing there. You have a habit of eavesdropping, I think, Mr Zabini.”  
  
“I’m sorry, sir.”  
  
“Do not apologise. There is nothing wrong in acquiring knowledge. It is what you do with it that counts.” He paused and placed his hands together by the fingertips. “Did you find Mr Longbottom?”  
  
“How did you know ...” Blaise stopped – too flabbergasted to speak.  
  
“... that you’d inform him? I didn’t  _know_ , but I rather hoped your feelings for Miss Brown would lead you to help her friend.” He paused as Blaise looked at him in shock. “Mr Zabini, it is very hard to conduct a romance in Hogwarts away from prying portrait eyes.”  
  
Thoroughly discomforted by now, Blaise turned towards the door.   
  
“Do not worry, they are very discreet and not a word will reach other’s ears.”  
  
Muttering his thanks and apologies, Blaise left the room and returned to the sanctity of his dorm. He was tired and thinking that Amycus would be combing the castle looking for Longbottom, he decided to skip Dark Arts.   
  


***

  
  
“Where is he?” roared Amycus at the three remaining Gryffindors. “Where’s yer pal Longbottom gone?”  
  
He herded them up against the corridor wall.   
  
“We don’t know,” Parvati cried. Lavender clutched her hand. She’d never seen Amycus looking this angry. Behind him stood Malfoy, Crabbe, Goyle and Nott. Fleetingly, she wondered where Blaise was and if he’d show up.   
  
Amycus punched Seamus hard in the face and the Gryffindor fell to the floor. Crabbe moved in and began to kick him in the stomach. Seamus yelled out in pain as Goyle launched a kick at his head and then he went silent.   
  
“He’s unconscious, you evil bastard!” shrieked Lavender. She threw herself across Seamus and glared up at Amycus. “We don’t know where Neville is. The last time I saw him, he was heading for the Owlery. He had a letter to send.” She could feel blood on her hands and realised the gash on Seamus’ cheek had split open again, and there was a fresh cut on his forehead.   
  
“Professor Carrow!”  
  
Lavender turned her head and felt faint with relief as she saw Professor McGonagall approaching with Madam Pomfrey.   
  
“What is the meaning of this?”   
  
“I’m looking fer Longbottom. His little friends won’t tell me where he is,” spat Amycus as his pudgy fingers curled around his wand.   
  
Professor McGonagall took in the scene and held her wand firmly in front of her. “I must protest at this treatment. They have done no wrong, Carrow.” She addressed Madam Pomfrey. “Poppy, please take Finnegan to the hospital wing.” She glared at Amycus. “ _I_ authorise his treatment. Miss Brown, Miss Patil – you will assist with Finnegan.”   
  
“Don’t interfere, Minerva.” Amycus leant over but she raised her wand to his throat.   
  
“I will not let you mistreat him any longer. They clearly have no idea where Longbottom is, so I must insist you leave them alone.” She turned her back on him and ushered the two girls along the corridor, following Madam Pomfrey who was levitating Seamus on a stretcher.  
  
“We’re fine, Professor,” whispered Lavender. “They only attacked Seamus.”  
  
Professor McGonagall was silent whilst she led them away from Amycus but then she began to speak in a low voice. “I know you’re fine, but I needed to speak to you.” She paused. “Is Longbottom safe?”  
  
Lavender nodded.  
  
“Good. Now, girls, I know I can’t force you to keep your heads down, so you must promise me that if you think you’re in danger, you’ll join him. I can cover for you and assist in any way possible, but if I outright defy the headmaster then the other Gryffindors will suffer. Is that clear?”  
  
Both girls nodded. They stopped at a corner. Professor McGonagall looked down the corridor – Amycus was no longer there. “Good. Now go with Madam Pomfrey and help her with Finnegan.”  
  
In the hospital wing, Seamus remained unconscious. Madam Pomfrey applied some salve to the worst of his bruises and Lavender watched in relief as they melted away.   
  
“Miss Brown,” she called. “Would you assist me in making some more salve, Miss Patil can stay with Finnegan.”   
  
Obediently, Lavender followed the Matron to her apothecary room. “I’m not very good with potions and things, Madam Pomfrey, but I’ll certainly help if I can.”  
  
Madame Pomfrey smiled. “That was just a ruse my dear. There is a degree of confidentiality attached to my work, as I’m sure you know, and I need to talk to you. Take a seat, please, Miss Brown.”  
  
Lavender sat on the wooden chair next to a desk in the corner of the room. Madam Pomfrey Summoned a set of parchment notes from a cabinet in the opposite corner and pulled out a quill from the pot in front of her.   
  
“Now,” Madam Pomfrey said as she read through Lavender’s notes. “How are you getting on with the contraceptive Potion I prescribed for you, Miss Brown? Any side effects?”  
  
“Oh!” Lavender blushed slightly. “Umm, no, it’s fine thank you, Madam Pomfrey.”  
  
“And you’re taking it every morning as we discussed.” Lavender nodded and the Matron continued. “That’s good to hear. So, you have no complaints or questions for me.”  
  
“No, not a thing,” Lavender replied. “Well, it tasted awful, but I sorted that out quite easily.”  
  
In the process of putting her quill down, Madam Pomfrey jerked her head up. “What do you mean?” she demanded.   
  
Lavender jumped. “It was nothing, Madam Pomfrey. I mean I’m still taking the potion ... but I ... err ... added some sugar, that’s all, so it would taste better.”  
  
“Sugar!” exclaimed Madam Pomfrey. “Oh, sweet Merlin. Miss Brown, what exactly were you taught in Potions? Sugar is one of those ingredients that should never be added unless the Potioneer knows exactly what they’re doing. It counteracts so many of the other agents and is the reason most potions, like Skelegrow for instance, taste so awful.” She leant forward and took Lavender’s hand. “Have you been doing this regularly?  
  
Lavender gazed blankly at her and whispered, “Yes.”  
  
“When was your last period?” she asked in concern.   
  
Thoughts whirred around Lavender’s mind. Images flashed in front of her. Slughorn’s storeroom, Firenze’s classroom and all the other places where her and Blaise had met up. “Err,” she said thickly, as tears began to well up. “I don’t know ... Four or five weeks perhaps. But I’m never that regular…”  
  
Madam Pomfrey increased the pressure on her hand. “It’s too early to tell at this stage,” she said wearily, “ but you’d better keep your fingers crossed. Pregnancy will only add to your troubles, Miss Brown, especially,” she indicated out of the small window looking into the ward to Seamus still lying unconscious, “as the father appears to have a knack for getting into trouble.”   
  
Lavender yelped. “It’s not Seamus... Merlin, no!”  
  


***

  
  
When Neville had been gone for four days, and had sent word via a brief flash of his Galleon that he was safe, Lavender persuaded Seamus to join him.   
  
Both he and Anthony Goldstein, who’d been caught stealing Essence of Murtlap from Slughorn’s stores, had faced three nights of detentions. Amycus Carrow had led the punishment and Lavender wasn’t sure Seamus would survive much longer.   
  
“We need you alive, Seamus. They won’t care if you’re dead because half-bloods like us aren’t as valuable to them as a pureblood.” She smoothed his matted hair away from his bloody cheek and dabbed the cut with a cloth. “Please leave.”  
  
He groaned and squeezed her hand. “I can’t leave you and Parvati.”  
  
“We’ll be okay. Amycus and the Slytherin boys can’t drag us out of our dorm and if things get really bad we’ll join you.”  
  
Seamus tried to crack a joke but winced instead. “I suppose a snog with you’s out the question?”  
  
“Seamus Finnegan, what is it you’re always saying about that Blarney stone? Have you been kissing it again?” She smiled ruefully. “A snog would cause you too much pain.”  
  
Seamus sighed. “It’d be worth it.” He looked at her curiously through eyes that were half closed by the swelling on his face. “Tell me, Lavender, your new fella, does he treat you well?”   
  
Lavender stopped dabbing at his face. “What new fella?” she asked casually as she turned away.   
  
Seamus chuckled. “We’ve known each other a long time and I know you’re seeing someone. You’re lit up like a Christmas tree most of the time, and that’s not from Divination, however handsome you find Firenze.”  
  
Lavender began to dab at his cheek again. “He treats me just fine, Seamus,” she replied but she bit her lip because she wasn’t sure how Blaise would react when she told him about her stupidity.   
  
 _I have to talk to him,_  she thought.  _I can’t put this off any longer._  
  


***

  
  
_It was_ , thought Blaise,  _a well-practised manoeuvre by now._ Either he or Lavender would be sitting in the library and the other would brush past as they replaced a book. After a while, the other would get up, retrieve the book and its message inside.   
  
Lavender brushed past him, and although she looked far more nervous than usual, he smiled wondering where she wanted to meet next. After five minutes, he approached the bookshelf, laughing as he recognised one of their second year texts ‘Year with a Yeti’ as her message’s chosen receptacle.   
  
 _‘Meet me outside the Charms’ classroom as soon as possible.’_ She had scrawled the words on a scrap of parchment, and Blaise frowned slightly, because although it was undeniably her neat, slightly fanciful writing, there was an underlying feeling of urgency to the note. He jerked his head up but she was already leaving the library.   
  
“Everyfing all right, Zabini?” Blaise turned to see Crabbe standing next to him. He shut the book quickly and assumed a bored expression.  
  
“Perfect,” he drawled. “Do you want me for anything, Crabbe?”  
  
“Professor Snape was looking for you,” Crabbe replied. “Sounded important.”  
  
Blaise swore under his breath as he strode out of the library. He’d have to see Snape first and hope it wouldn’t take too long.  
  


***

  
  
Lavender walked along the corridor, wondering what on earth she was going to say to Blaise. The possibility that she could be pregnant had kept her awake for three nights now, and her nerves were in tatters. She cursed herself again and again over her idiocy with the potion. This could not be happening. It was just not possible that she was pregnant, and oh, hell, what was Blaise going to say?   
  
She wasn’t even sure how she felt about a baby. She certainly didn’t think she could cope... but the thought of getting rid of it. She shuddered. So much death; she wasn’t sure she could be responsible for another. She shook her head. _I’m not pregnant,_ she thought determinedly.  _We’ll look back on this and laugh._  
  
Lavender scanned the corridor but could see no sign of Blaise as she got to the alcove next to the Charms classroom. The first time they’d met here – the night of Hagrid’s party -- it had been Blaise bearing bad news ... now it was her turn.   
  
“Come on,” she muttered, “before I get cold feet and put it off again.”  
  
Feeling her head start to pound, she leant against the cool stone wall and closed her eyes. An arm reached around her waist, much like Blaise’s had in the library, but Lavender knew instinctively that it wasn’t him. Her eyes flew open and there grinning at her was Crabbe.   
  
“Hullo, Brown,” he murmured. Reaching out his hand to her hair, he pulled her head back sharply. “Bet you wasn’t expecting me.”


	7. What if?

_'If you love me, dilly dilly, never to roam,  
If I love you, dilly dilly, babies must come.  
Pink for a girl, dilly dilly, blue for a boy,  
Binding us close, dilly dilly, bringing us joy.'_

  
  
  
There was no spiked drink this time; nothing that could stop her screaming or paralyse her, so Crabbe used brute force instead. He dragged her into the alcove and clutching at her wand hand, he smashed it again and again into the rough stone wall until she dropped her wand in pain.   
  
  
“Get off,” she tried to shout, but he clamped a clammy hand over her mouth and, with the other, he ripped open her robe. His hand groped at her breast, and then he pushed himself hard against her.   
  
  
“You might as well give up, Lavender. Zabini’s got other fings to do, and he won’t be able to save you. Not like last time, when you wouldn’t play along. I only wanted a kiss.” He placed his wet lips on her cheek and she shuddered as she heard his breathing turn heavier. “You wouldn’t be nice, though, would you?”  
  
  
Lavender’s eyes widened in terror as he held his wand to her throat. “Scream and I’ll kill yer.” Slowly, he released his hand from her mouth and began to pull at his belt. “Don’t cry,” he said in his soft child-like voice. “You might enjoy it.”  
  
  
“Please don’t,” she said and began to sob as Crabbe’s hand moved downwards, his fingers splaying out on her belly, touching her bare skin, pressing hard into her stomach.   
  
  
It was that movement that brought her to life. She wasn’t going to let this happen. She didn’t care now if she died, she wasn’t going to suffer this. Sharply, she brought up her knee into his groin, and then she screamed.  
  
  
“BITCH!” yelled Crabbe, and slapped her hard across the face with the back of his hand. Lavender ducked down to retrieve her wand. Her hand hurt like hell, and she realised it was broken. Crabbe laughed as he pointed his wand at her face. “ _Cru_ … Aghh!” He jerked back in pain as a yellow bolt of light hit him squarely in the face.   
  
  
Lavender turned her head and wept in relief as she saw Blaise pounding down the corridor.   
  
  
“RUN!” he shouted. “Get out of here, NOW!”  
  
  
Lavender flung herself at him, clutching at her torn robes. “He remembers everything, Blaise. The Memory Charm’s worn off,” she said, crying.  
  
  
Blaise looked down at her tear-stained face. “You have to get out of here. The whole castle would have heard you scream. They will punish you - badly. Find Neville and Seamus … and stay there.”  
  
  
“Come with me,” she whispered. “Please.”  
  
  
He shook his head decisively and cupped her face. Gently bestowing one soft kiss on her lips, he said, “I can’t. I have to report this to Professor Snape, otherwise Crabbe will try again.”  
  
  
“Snape won’t do a bloody thing!” Lavender argued desperately. “You know that.”  
  
  
“I think he will … unless I’ve seriously misjudged things.”  
  
  
They heard the sound of voices from the far end of the corridor. Alecto was barking out orders. Crabbe stirred and began to yell.   
  
  
“Run!” ordered Blaise. Then, as he pushed her away from him, he cast  _Protego_ between them both, turned around and faced Alecto.   
  
  
Lavender’s last sight as she fled for the Room of Requirement was Alecto’s jinx glancing off the side of Blaise’s face.   
  
  
“I need to be with Neville. I need to be with Neville. I need to be with Neville.” Lavender ran along the seventh floor corridor, and then, finally, a small door opened. Neville looked out and yanked her inside. Sweaty, crying, with a bloodied hand and ripped robes, Lavender sank to the floor.   
  
  
“What’s happened? Has he attacked you?” Neville’s question reverberated through the room.   
  
  
“No,” she moaned. “It was Crabbe. I’ve had to run. Oh, Merlin, Neville, I’ve left Parvati by herself. I couldn’t stay.”  
  
  
Seamus limped across, still holding his ribs. “What happened to your hand?”  
  
  
She looked at it. “Crabbe smashed it into the wall so I’d drop my wand.”  
  
  
“Did he,” began Neville, and then reddened, “force you to do anything?”  
  
  
“No, he tried but …” she smiled briefly, “I kneed him where it hurts.” As the adrenaline of flight left her system, she began shivering. Neville wrapped a blanket around her and then handed her a mug of tea. It was sweet and she strongly suspected that he’d laced it with Firewhisky. She was halfway through when she remembered that she might be pregnant. She gazed for a long time at the cup, swirling the liquid around and around.  
  
  
“It’s not tea leaves, Lavender,” teased Seamus. “You can’t tell our fortune.”  
  
  
Slowly, she put the cup down. “I don’t want anymore, Neville. Thank you.”  
  
  


***

  
  
  
Blaise sat in a cell in the dungeons. He wasn’t chained, but, stripped of his wand, he felt vulnerable. After Lavender had fled, he’d remained silent as Alecto had dragged him to this place.  _At least she hasn’t manacled me to the wall,_ he thought, as he remembered the sight of a Gryffindor second year being punished for something not allowed under their regime.   
  
  
Blaise remembered he’d felt sick to the stomach, but he hadn’t said anything. He never said anything unless it affected him … or those he loved.  
  
  
He knew now that he loved her, and it hit him powerfully. He’d enjoyed the chase, delighted in her capitulation, and reveled in a highly charged affair in the most unlikely places … but this was something else. This was an overwhelming need to protect her and to believe in the things she held dear.   
  
  
He’d been halfway to Snape’s office when he’d seen the Head depart, so, smiling, he’d turned away and sauntered along the corridor to see Lavender. Then he’d been struck by the thought of Crabbe standing in front of him, telling him that Snape  _urgently_  needed to see him, and Blaise had broken into a run.   
  
  
He’d seen Lavender on the floor, robes torn, a harsh red mark on her cheek, a bloodied hand, and realised the intent of his fellow Slytherin before Crabbe had opened his mouth.   
  
  
And then he’d acted.  
  
  
It wasn’t like the last time when he’d been cool in the face of Crabbe’s stupid assault. Lavender had meant nothing to him then, except for the vague possibility of a dalliance because he was curious that he‘d smelt her in Amortentia. But this time a white-hot anger had coursed through his veins, and he’d hexed Crabbe with all the force he could muster. Crabbe, he was pleased to hear, was currently in the hospital wing being treated for a stinging jinx to his face and a severely bruised groin.   
  
  
Alecto had slung him in this cell, but dared not do more without the Headmaster’s approval, for his mother, with her money and connections, was still valuable to Voldemort.   
  
  
Blaise looked up when he heard the lock turn on his cell, and his heart lurched. But it wasn’t either of the Carrows, or Professor Snape. Instead, it was Daphne with a tray of food, let in by Filch.   
  
  
“You don’t deserve this, but Professor Slughorn thinks you should eat,” she said scornfully, but her expression belied her words. She crouched next to him.   
  
  
“Are you okay?” she mouthed. Blaise nodded.   
  
  
“I’ll wait until you’ve finished,” she declared out loud. Blaise heard Filch grunt something as he shuffled off.  
  
  
“I don’t have much time,” Daphne said urgently, “but is there anything I can do?”  
  
  
“Oh, Merlin, Daph. I’m sorry about this, but I have to know … Is she safe?”  
  
  
Daphne smiled sadly. “If by ‘she’ you mean Lavender Brown, then yes, she got away.” She sniffed. “I take it she was the reason we finished?”  
  
  
Blaise looked directly at her. Her soft, blonde hair fell in wisps about her neck. He’d liked being with her enough not to hurt her when he’d realised he wanted Lavender more. “Sorry,” he whispered.  
  
  
“You love her, don’t you?”  
  
  
Blaise swallowed. He ran a hand over his brow, rubbing his eyes. He tried to shrug off her question, but as he looked at her, he felt himself nod slightly. Daphne looked away.   
  
  
“I’m sorry,” he repeated and then stopped. “Daph … I need you to do something … it’s important.”  
  
  
“Tell me,” she said, her voice wavering slightly.  
  
  
He spoke quickly, aware time was running out. “Crabbe wanted to rape her tonight. He tried before Christmas with a spiked drink, but I Confunded him and then cast a Memory Charm. But it’s worn off, and I didn’t get a chance to repeat it, so that’s why she’s run.” He paused and then reached for her hand. “I need you to warn the other girls. I don’t think he’ll touch you or any of the other Slytherins, but others, like Parvati, are vulnerable. Can you get to them?”  
  
  
Daphne gulped and then squeezed his hand. “I can speak to Padma … We still talk sometimes.” She stood up as Filch rattled at the door.  
  
  
“Thank you.” he said.  
  
  
“What do you plan on doing now?” she murmured.   
  
  
Blaise smiled slightly. “Come on, Daph, I can talk my way out of anything -- you know that!”  
  
  


***

  
  
  
“What in Merlin’s name have you been doing for food and things?” asked Lavender, after she’d slept surprisingly well on a comfortable bed that Neville had provided for her. The room had also given her a nightdress and a screen for her to hide behind while she’d changed, although she’d giggled slightly as both Neville and Seamus had averted their eyes.   
  
  
“Ah-ha!” exclaimed Neville. He took her hand and led her to a portrait of a young girl who was smiling vacantly. “This is Ariana and she is our lifeline. She gets me food and water.”  
  
  
Lavender looked all around. “Is there any chance she can provide bathrooms?”  
  
  
“Oh!” said Neville, slightly shamefaced. “I … err … didn’t think of that.”  
  
  
Lavender wrinkled her nose and laughed. “I can tell. Look, Neville, this place is going to be teeming with people soon, and we’re not all content with a bucket in the corner.”  
  
  
Neville blushed. “We need bathrooms,” he uttered to the air, and Lavender watched in awe as two perfect rooms appeared.  
  
  
“And bath oil?” she asked hopefully as she walked into the one marked ‘witches’.  
  
  
She ran herself a bath and, dripping fragrant oil into it, watched as the steam clouded the air. Then, as she stepped in, she picked up a flannel (that had suddenly appeared as she’d thought of it), and began to scrub at her neck, her breasts and thighs - everywhere Crabbe had touched. She scrubbed until it was raw - save for her stomach. She tried to remember her last kiss with Blaise, for it was all a hideous blur now, confused with the flabby, moist lips of Crabbe and his pudgy hands invading her. She curled her knees up to her chest and drained the bath. Then she added more water and began to scrub again. Finally, when the hot water began to sting, she felt clean. She looked about for a towel and one appeared. She thought of Blaise, but he did not miraculously materialise, and then nearly cried again, with relief, when she thought of him cupping her face and kissing her lips just before she fled.   
  
  
Drying herself quickly, she got dressed in her torn robes, which, she noticed, Neville or Seamus had tried to repair. She walked out to see Anthony Goldstein sitting with them. His face, too, was swollen.   
  
  
“What’s the plan then, boys?” she said chirpily as she sat down next to them.   
  
  
“Lie low ‘til the end of term, or until Harry gets here, I think,” Neville replied. “We can’t go home without putting our families in danger.”  
  
  
Lavender turned to Anthony. “Are your family safe?”  
  
  
He shook his head. “My mum’s a half blood … but my dad’s a Muggle-born.” He stared bleakly at her. “He was given to the Dementors.”  
  
  
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, knowing it was wholly inadequate.   
  
  


***

  
  
  
At lunchtime that day, Filch opened Blaise’s cell again and Snape strode in.  
  
  
“Get up!” he ordered and dragged Blaise out of the door.  
  
  
In his office, Snape gestured to a hard chair. Blaise sat down while Snape remained standing behind his desk.   
  
  
“You are the Head Boy, Zabini,” he said in barely controlled fury. “You are supposed to be in control of the students, not hexing your fellow Slytherins so badly that they end up in the Hospital wing.”  
  
  
Blaise stared ahead, saying nothing.  
  
  
“Do you have an explanation, or is it merely your romantic entanglements getting in the way?” He paused and glared at Blaise. “I warned you about getting involved with someone - especially a witch from Gryffindor. It cannot end well.”  
  
  
“Sir, please listen.”  
  
  
Snape held up his hand. “The story I shall put about is that she tried to play you both for fools.”  
  
  
“No!” shouted Blaise angrily. “That’s not what happened.”  
  
  
“Zabini, do you want to remain Head Boy?”  
  
  
Tearing off the badge from his robe lapel, Blaise stood up. “Actually, sir, I don’t give a toss about this fucking badge.” He threw it across the desk. “I don’t know why you picked me ahead of Malfoy - he seems the perfect choice - but I thought it was because you knew I wasn’t a Carrow lapdog.” He leant across the desk. “I’m seeing Lavender Brown. She’s a Gryffindor and she’s bloody proud of that. I’m a Slytherin, and as much as I want to be proud of what I am --”   
  
  
“Sit down,” Snape said, in a softer tone.  
  
  
“No! Sir, Crabbe tried to rape her tonight. He also tried before Christmas. Am I supposed to let that happen because he’s from the same House as me?”  
  
  
Snape sat down. He gestured to Blaise to do the same and eventually Blaise returned to his chair. Snape reached into one of his desk draws and pulled out a wand. Blaise sat very still; the wand was his and he suddenly felt very uncertain.  
  
  
“Why didn’t you tell me this before?” Snape said at last.  
  
  
Blaise closed his eyes. “Because, sir, you are here on the Dark Lord’s orders and Crabbe’s father is a Death Eater, so I didn’t think you’d care.”  
  
  
“And now?” Snape’s glare was penetrating.  
  
  
Staring at the headmaster, and then at the portrait of Professor Dumbledore, who was looking down with a look of utmost concentration, Blaise said, “Now, sir, I don’t know. I don’t think it was an accident that I overheard the Carrows’ plans to dispose of Longbottom. And … you warned me away from Lavender, but you didn’t punish me.”  
  
  
Snape touched his chin with his thumb and forefinger. “Those are dangerous sentiments to be uttering, Zabini. I never took you for a fool.”  
  
  
Blaise kept unblinking eye contact with Snape.   
  
  
Snape held out the wand. “What do you want from me?”   
  
  
Blaise’s stomach flipped over as he felt the tension dissipate. Accepting his wand, he said, “Just warn Crabbe off, sir, that’s all. I don’t care what you say about me, but Lavender’s done nothing wrong, so don’t slander her.”  
  
  
“Where is Miss Brown now?” Snape enquired.  
  
  
Blaise sighed. “I truly don’t know, sir, but even if I did, I wouldn’t tell.” He stood up. “May I go now?”  
  
  
Snape nodded, but as Blaise reached the door, he called him back. “Mr Zabini -- your badge, I think you’ve forgotten it.”  
  
  
“Really, sir, give it to Malfoy or Nott. It’s not important to me.”  
  
  
He saw Snape glower at him. “Just pick it up. You’re Head Boy until I decide otherwise.”  
  
  
As Blaise walked into the Slytherin common room, he was aware of the room’s eyes on him. He paused by the door and then, very deliberately, he pinned the Head Boy’s badge back onto his robe, and walked towards his dormitory. He heard a sharp intake of breath - probably from Goyle - but did not stop. He had hoped to find the room empty, but Malfoy was there.   
  
  
“H -he let you out,” Malfoy stuttered in disbelief, “and with barely a scratch.”  
  
  
Blaise shrugged. “What can I say? It must be my charm, Malfoy.”  
  
  
He pulled off his robes and shirt, aware that he hadn’t had a wash and a change of clothes since the previous day. Touching a hand to his cheek, he could feel the scar from Alecto’s hex. It still hurt but he wouldn’t give her - or any of them - the satisfaction of knowing how much.  
  
  
“Why did you risk everything for Weasley’s reject?” Malfoy’s question intruded on his thoughts.   
  
  
Reaching into his trunk and pulling out his soap, toothbrush and a large fluffy towel, Blaise ignored Malfoy and walked towards the bathroom. Draco blocked his path.  
  
  
“I mean, she’s pretty enough for the occasional screw, but hardly our class.”  
  
  
Blaise looked at him. He was at least a head taller than Malfoy, and whereas the others in Slytherin had always been in awe of the Malfoy name, Blaise had been unimpressed.  
  
  
“Is blood status really that important to you, Malfoy?” he asked, aware that he was uttering treasonable words, but Malfoy genuinely seemed to want to know.  
  
  
“Of course,” Malfoy replied, but he didn’t sound as sure any more. “I said she was pretty, but there are others. Why  _not_  let Crabbe kiss her?”  
  
  
“It wasn’t just a kiss, you moron!” Blaise spat. “Merlin, are you so blind these days that you can’t see what Crabbe’s like now? He’s not your stooge anymore. And whether the girl is half blood, pure blood or even a Muggle, he shouldn’t be allowed to rape her!”  
  
  
Malfoy flinched at his words. “H -he wouldn’t do that.”  
  
  
“It was his second attempt,” Blaise shouted angrily. “And then, when she kneed him in the bollocks because he’d smashed her wand hand to fuck, he tried to use the Cruciatus curse on her. What had she done to deserve that?”  
  
  
Malfoy stared at him, open-mouthed.  
  
  
Blaise took a deep breath, trying to regain some semblance of control, and looked directly into the troubled grey eyes. There was something else going on, he was sure of it. Malfoy had been different since Easter, but Blaise had never been adept at  _reading_  minds, only at closing off his own thoughts. He spoke again, in a softer tone. “Mal … Draco, you’d have done the same as me. You couldn’t have stood by and done nothing … whoever was being tortured, could you?”  
  
  
Malfoy went white and began to shiver uncontrollably. Then he turned away and ran to the toilets. From outside in the corridor Blaise could hear him being violently sick. “You okay?” he called.  
  
  
“Piss off and leave me alone,” Draco yelled back, and continued retching.  
  
  
In the common room, Daphne sat in the corner playing cards. She smiled slightly as Blaise entered, so he walked towards her.  
  
  
“I spoke to Padma,” she whispered in undertone. “She said Parvati’s left too, as well as that Goldstein boy from her own House.” She paused. “They’re not very subtle are they? They’ll only be Slytherins left soon.” Picking up the cards, she started to shuffle them. “I don’t think darling Alecto is fond of you, or Professor Snape, at the moment. She hates blood traitors with a passion.”  
  
  
Blaise fingered his scar gingerly. “Yeah, I know.” He cast a glance around the room and noticed how people averted their eyes when he looked in their direction. “What are this lot saying?”  
  
  
Daphne laughed. “Oh, well, most of the girls are on your side, probably because they fancy you, but they’re not happy about Lavender, obviously. Pansy is furious, as you can imagine. I’m not sure she was entirely truthful when she said she wanted to wind Draco up. Tabitha is sobbing her heart out, having convinced herself you were on the verge of proposing.” Daphne snorted and smirked maliciously. “As for the boys … Goyle is angry, Draco is … distracted and Theo can’t work out why anyone would want to snog a girl in the first place.”  
  
  
“What about you?” he asked softly.  
  
  
Daphne placed the cards on the table and sighed. “I wish we were still together, Blaise, but I’m not going to drip-feed a love potion into you to make you stay.”  
  
  


***

  
  
  
In the Room of Requirement, Lavender and Parvati were giggling together. After a year of oppression, they were reveling in the freedom of this room. Parvati had turned up nearly a week before, carrying piles of clothes for her and Lavender. It had been like old times when even Hermione had sat around their fireside eating chocolate and giggling over inanities.   
  
  
“She used to bring us those Muggle magazines, didn’t she?” said Lavender fondly. “I’d forgotten about that. Merlin, I was such a bitch to her last year.”  
  
  
“Not entirely your fault,” Parvati replied. She leant over to a small bedside table and picked up her blue butterfly hairclip. Lavender watched with a smile as Parvati pinned up her glossy dark hair. “Ron wasn’t exactly subtle either.”  
  
  
“I wonder where they are now,” Lavender mused. She took a sip of her pumpkin juice and pulled a face. “Urgh! Does this taste right to you?”   
  
  
Parvati took a sip. “Fine to me.” She stood up. “Come on; let’s find Padma and the others.”  
  
  
Lavender yawned. “In a bit. I think I’ll just stay here a while longer.”  
  
  
Parvati left and Lavender reclined on the bed. Not for the first time, her thoughts drifted to Blaise, and she smiled as she remembered him kissing her. The relief she’d felt when Padma had told her that he’d been locked up, then released on Snape’s orders, had been palpable. And although Lavender was sure that they were all wondering why Blaise Zabini, of all people, had rushed to her rescue, no one had broached the subject of him or Crabbe.  
  
  
The two Hufflepuff girls, Hannah and Susan, had cast curious but sympathetic looks at her, when they’d arrived the day before, but Lavender suspected that Neville had asked them to remain silent. The room had produced two more beds for them, awash with squashy yellow and black cushions.   
  
  
Padma, Lisa Turpin, and Mandy Brocklehurst had all arrived that morning with news that the Carrows had intensified the search for the seventh year Gryffindors by cracking down on any Hufflepuffs or Ravenclaws who ventured anywhere except for their lessons. The Ravenclaw girls only managed to get here because Terry and Michael had resisted detention, giving the girls a chance to run. They’d set up their own beds in a different part of the room, and adorned them with blue and bronze hangings. Yet everyone sat in the centre of the room, and during the day it was as if their Sorting seven years before had never happened.   
  
  
One cause, one aim - to stay alive.   
  
  
“What if a Slytherin turns up?” Padma asked one day. ‘What if?’ was a favourite game. Lavender imagined it was a frequent pastime of the Ravenclaws, who always came out with complicated answers that Lavender invariably failed to follow. They sat in a circle, swigging from a bottle of Firewhisky that Neville had got from Aberforth the night before.   
  
  
Hannah blanched at Padma’s question, but Seamus said, “It would depend on the Slytherin. I’m not letting that Bulstrode girl in, but Daphne and Tabitha are lookers.”  
  
  
“Well, if it’s for aesthetic purposes only,” declared Lisa, rolling her eyes, “then it could only be Zabini. He may be a Slytherin but he’s bloody sexy. I wouldn’t mind …” She trailed off in embarrassment as she remembered Lavender was in the room.   
  
  
“What if Hagrid came back and Grawp crushed Alecto with a big club?” asked Neville, with a quick glance at Lavender. She smiled back, grateful at his change of subject.   
  
  
“We could have a real party then, and pelt Amycus and Snape with Hagrid’s rock cakes,” Lavender offered. The others all laughed.   
  
  
“What if Sybil Trelawney seduced Snape and married him?” asked Hannah with a giggle.   
  
  
“That would never happen,” snorted Parvati. “Professor Trelawney isn‘t that idiotic.”   
  
  
Padma threw a Pumpkin pasty crust at her. “Play the game, sis. It’s ‘what if?’ Nothing is impossible.”  
  
  
“I think,” interrupted Anthony with a grin, “that Sybil would read his tea leaves and predict his doom every morning, unless he washed his hair.”  
  
  
“And then,” continued Mandy, “Snape would hex himself rather than spend a moment longer in her company.”  
  
  
They all giggled. Seamus took a swig from the bottle and passed it on to Lavender. She shook her head, and handed it to Neville.   
  
  
“What if we can’t get home at the end of term?” asked Susan softly, as the laughter died down.   
  
  
The others were quiet, knowing Susan had lost so many members of her family and was desperate for news of her parents. Lavender felt a lump in her throat and then a wave of nausea ran though her. She ran to the toilet and was violently sick. Rinsing her mouth out and splashing her face with cold water, she stared at her wan face in the mirror. It was the end of April and she was now over three weeks late. By the end of term, she’d be three months gone. Lavender had no idea if she’d be showing then, or if she’d always feel so sick, but she knew she couldn’t stay here forever.   
  
  
And it hit her suddenly; this wasn’t just about her and Blaise anymore. Inside her was their baby, living on trust, created not in the best circumstance - that was true -- but this was not a child of violence. She shuddered, knowing that if it had been Crabbe’s baby inside her she would not have been able to cope, but this was Blaise’s child … and she loved him.   
  
  
Hesitantly, she stroked her belly, hardly daring to touch. It was an impossible situation. She needed Blaise so much, to hold her and tell her things would be all right, but she couldn’t reach him, and a part of her was terrified that he would not react well to this news.   
  
  
“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I’m sorry you’ll be born into all this horror.”  
  
  
“You okay?” Lavender looked up to see Seamus standing in the doorway.  
  
  
Fixing a bright smile on her face, she turned to look at him. “Fine, Seamus. Just needed …” She swayed, and Seamus ran towards her. Gently he lowered her to the ground.   
  
  
“Put your head between your knees. It’ll help,” he instructed.   
  
  
“What’s the matter?” asked Parvati as she walked in. She crouched next to Lavender and put an arm on hers.  
  
  
“She went white and I thought she was going to faint. Go and get her some chocolate or something, and a drink.”  
  
  
Hastily, Parvati ran out and then returned with a cup of Pumpkin Juice and a slab of chocolate. Lavender took a slug of the juice. “Urgh! That still tastes odd,” she said and shook her head at the chocolate.  
  
  
“That’s a first, you refusing chocolate,” said Parvati, laughing.   
  
  
Lavender joined in half-heartedly, but Seamus was silent.   
  
  
“Lavender,” he said softly, “Parvati said this wasn’t the first time Crabbe had tried something.” She looked up sharply and Seamus placed a finger on her cheek. “She was worried about you, not gossiping.” He paused. “How far did he actually go?”  
  
  
Parvati gasped and put a hand on his arm as if to tell him to avoid the subject, but Seamus ignored her.   
  
  
“Lavender, did he rape you?”  
  
  
She shook her head. “I’m not lying. He didn’t get that far either time, although he tried bloody hard.” She bit her lip and thought of Blaise powering down the corridor to her rescue again.   
  
  
“Could he have used a Memory Charm, or something?” Seamus persisted.  
  
  
She laughed in genuine surprise. “No, not at all. He didn’t have time. Besides, he failed Charms O.W.L. so I doubt he’d be able to cast an effective one. She frowned and looked at Seamus. “Why are you asking me all these questions?”  
  
  
Seamus touched her cheek again and then took her hand.   
  
  
“I have two older sisters, you know that, don’t you, and between them I have three nieces and a nephew.” He smiled slightly. “Over fond of witches in the Finnegan family.” Seamus became serious again. “Aisling, my younger sister, is expecting her second child. She was staying with us at Easter, Lavender.”   
  
  
He stopped speaking but edged even closer to her. “So, what if a certain Irish lad recognised the signs of pregnancy? What if he thinks his classmate and friend is pregnant?”  
  
  
“Oh God,” Lavender moaned, her voice cracking.   
  
  
She felt Parvati’s hand clench her shoulder. “Is Seamus right?” she asked in horror.   
  
  
Lavender looked at the bathroom floor, noticing how the water from the sink had dripped to form a puddle. “It could be a false alarm. I’m not that late,” she lied.  
  
  
“But if it’s not, we have to think of a way to get you out of here,” said Parvati. “You can’t stay here for nine months.” She took Lavender’s other hand as Seamus stroked her hair.  
  
  
“You can go to my mam’s,” he said. “If you want, you can tell her the baby’s mine. She’ll look after you, I promise.”  
  
  
Lavender sniffed and laid her head on Seamus’ shoulder. “I can’t do that,” she said tearfully.   
  
  
“Yes, you can,” he urged her. “I don’t mind.”  
  
  
“Oh, Merlin, Seamus.” She lifted her head and gently put her hand on his swollen cheek. “And what happens when I give birth to a baby who looks nothing like you?”  
  
  
Seamus shrugged. “Funny thing about babies. They all look like little old men when they’re born, but everyone still says they look like their dad.”  
  
  
She looked at Parvati and then back at Seamus. Raising her hand, she ruffled his sandy-brown hair. From the main room she could hear Padma and Anthony having a heated debate about the Protean Charm and its effectiveness on animate objects. She took a deep breath.   
  
  
“What if the father of my baby is Blaise Zabini?”


	8. Miles to Go

_If you die first, dilly dilly, maybe you will,  
I will live on, dilly dilly, loving you still._

  
  
Parvati and Seamus were not angry at Lavender, or disgusted, or any of the things she had imagined. And she knew she wouldn’t lose them, would not lose  _any_  of her friends to something like this. They sat on her bed, and she told them how it had began, how Blaise had warned her that the Carrows were heading for Hagrid’s Hut to break up the party, how his warning that Neville would be ‘disposed’ of had led to him running, and finally how he’d saved her twice from Crabbe.  
  
Parvati, Lavender thought, had looked slightly hurt that she hadn’t confided all of this to her before, but she’d held her close while Seamus fussed over her and in the end, they had persuaded her to eat something and then to rest.   
  
So Lavender lay on her bed, the Gryffindor banners hanging around her, declaring her intent and her bravery for all to see.   
  
 _I won’t go,_ she thought,  _not until it becomes impossible to stay. I can’t leave without Blaise._  
  
Holding on until the end of term became her guide stick, and then she could talk to him. No doubt Blaise would rail at her stupidity – he was adept at Potions and would surely have known what sugar would do – but then again, he might surprise her and if not be exactly pleased, he  _might_  just understand.   
  
Around teatime, a loud commotion roused her. Opening the curtains, she saw the last remaining seventh year Ravenclaws, led by Terry Boot, crowd into the room. Terry’s face was battered like so many of others’, but he was grinning widely and punching the air.   
  
“It’s all over the papers!” he cried. “Harry, Ron and Hermione broke into Gringotts bank last night.” Terry looked at his captive audience, delighting in their awe. “They robbed the Lestrange vault and, oh Merlin, they escaped on a dragon!”  
  
There was a loud cheer from every corner of the room. Neville clapped Terry on the back and then stepped aside to let Padma deal with the gash on his face.   
  
“Isn’t it wonderful?” breathed Lavender, joining in the celebrations. This was the first genuine joy she’d felt since turning up here. Harry must have had a reason to break into Gringotts, and the fact that Ron and Hermione were with him, still alive, gave her hope that she’d still get out of here intact.   
  
“Where’s Neville?” she asked Seamus, as he topped up her water glass.   
  
Seamus jerked his head towards the portrait in the corner. “Ariana came. Must have a message from Aberforth.” He handed her some toast. “You must eat,” he continued.  
  
Lavender chewed tentatively and then found she was hungry after all, so finished both slices. Feeling stronger, she was about to fetch herself something else to eat when an ear-splitting roar erupted – far noisier than when Terry had appeared. She turned her head to see Neville climbing back into the room accompanied by Harry, Ron and Hermione.   
  
It all became unreal after that. Harry was mumbling about not staying, Neville was shouting for a revolution and more people appeared summoned by their Galleons. Seamus’ face when he saw Dean was suffused with such joy, that Lavender doubted he’d ever stop smiling. Luna, so calm, stood between Harry and Neville as both argued about the reason for their visit.   
  
Ron, with his hand on Harry’s arm, was giving advice. He was different, more commanding, as if he’d found his place in life. Looking at him standing next to Hermione, Lavender felt nothing for him except relief at seeing all three of them alive.   
  
Harry was becoming exasperated at the expectation that they would fight and was arguing vehemently, but Lavender knew that they’d fight now. Grown restive over the yearlong repression, they needed action and would no longer be content to sit it out until the end of term.   
  
“If we’re fighting,” murmured Parvati, “you must stay here, okay?”  
  
“Absolutely not!” retorted Lavender. She grabbed Parvati by the arm. “What do you think will happen to me if You-Know-Who’s side win? My indiscretion won’t be forgiven, will it? And even if I manage to evade them, how long will it be before someone puts two and two together? A Gryffindor slag knocked up by a Slytherin. I’ll be hated by everyone. What future is that for a baby?”  
  
“You could die out there, and then your baby has no future at all.”  
  
“So could any of us,” Lavender hissed. She took a deep breath and stared into Parvati’s eyes. “Look, I need to be in control of this. I can’t wait around hoping things will work out. _If_  I’m pregnant – and it could still be a false alarm – I need the baby to have a future, and it won’t have one under the Death Eater regime.”  
  
“You could still go abroad,” muttered Parvati.   
  
“I can’t live on the run, Parvati, not with a baby.”  
  
Parvati stared back at her, and then tossing back her long black hair, she reached up, removed her blue butterfly clip and tied her hair back into a severe ponytail.   
  
Lavender did the same.   
  
The two girls looked to the door as Harry returned with Professor McGonagall. “We’re fighting!” he declared grimly. The Weasley twins let out a rallying cheer. Lavender gripped her wand and joined the throng at the door.  
  
In the Great Hall, Professor McGonagall presided over organised chaos. The Heads of House, assisted by the returning seventh years, herded the pupils to their tables. As Lavender entered, she momentarily felt a thrill of expectation and then she saw Blaise.  
  
He was sitting – of course – at the Slytherin table, his eyes darting everywhere, and then they stopped as he found her. She felt a hopeless longing well up inside her, a longing to cross the floor, and have him tell her that things would be okay...  
  
Blaise stood up, but as Professor McGonagall and a wizard Neville said was called Shacklebolt began to speak, Professor Slughorn pulled him back down. He mouthed something to her and Lavender found herself close to tears again because she thought he’d said ‘I love you.’  
  
A voice echoing through the hall jerked her attention away from Blaise.  
  
“Give me Harry Potter.” **  
  
Parvati clutched at Lavender’s arm. “It’s him,” she whispered. Lavender nodded, but felt strangely calm. A year under Snape and the Carrows had savagely jolted any fear out of her.   
  
“You have until midnight.”**  
  
Lavender turned to look at Harry, wondering what he was thinking. He looked determined, but his face had blanched. It was as if he thought they’d hand him over ... save their own necks ... for his. She smiled grimly. She could not, would not hand anyone over to them, not even to save herself.  _The baby,_  she thought fleetingly, but then pushed the thought away. The baby  _might_ still be a false alarm. She didn’t know... not really.  
  
  
  
“But he’s there! Potter’s there! Someone grab him!” ** Pansy shrieked from the Slytherin table, denouncing Harry.  
  
Lavender wasn’t sure who stood up first at the Gryffindor table. It might have been Neville or Seamus. It might even have been her. It was a gut reaction, an instinct to protect their one hope. The Hufflepuffs, led by Ernie, proclaimed their unity and then the Ravenclaws faced down the Slytherins.   
  
To Lavender’s horror, the Slytherins stood up, but instead of standing shoulder to shoulder with their classmates, they began to leave. She didn’t know what she thought would happen as she watched Blaise corral the first years with Daphne. She’d hoped he’d stand up and declare his resolution to fight, as Ernie had, but she knew deep down that he wouldn’t. This was not his fight. Assumed to be a pureblood and Snape’s choice for Head Boy, he was safe and he’d always had a strong regard for his own skin. “Keep your head down and your mouth shut,” he’d once told her. This was not a battle of his choosing and so he was leaving.  
  


***

  
  
Blaise watched, his heart in his throat, as she walked into the Great Hall. It had been two weeks since he’d seen her, three since he’d held her, kissed her, slept with her. What he wanted, more than anything, was to cross that floor and take her away. He stood up, but Professor Slughorn held him back.   
  
“Now is not the time, my boy,” he whispered.  
  
“I love you,” Blaise mouthed to her, but he wasn’t sure she understood, because instead of flashing him one of her smiles, she suddenly looked unaccountably sad.   
  
Slughorn tugged urgently at his arm. “Blaise, you must get them out. Miss Parkinson will be of little use and I need someone responsible to ensure the Slytherins’ safety.” He looked around the hall.   
  
“Are you coming too, sir?” Blaise asked, urgently, but he already knew the answer.  
  
Slughorn sighed. “No, my boy. I have things in my past that I need to put right. Staying here to fight is merely a start. You, however, have no such obligation, and should leave now.” Slughorn’s eyes flickered towards the Gryffindor table and settled on Lavender. “Or perhaps you do have an obligation?”  
  
Blaise looked at Lavender, still standing in front of Harry as they faced the enemy. So proud, so determined, so reckless; he physically ached for her.  _For Merlin’s sake, don’t you dare fight,_  he thought fiercely.  _We can still get away – together._  He turned back to Professor Slughorn. “Sir, I’ll get them out.”  
  
As he rounded up the Slytherins and led them across the hall, Blaise turned his head back, trying to catch her eye to make her understand that he would return for her, but Lavender had turned her face away from him.  _Shit, she’s going to fight,_  he realised.  
  
He marched with Daphne up the staircases towards the seventh floor, where McGonagall had told them they could evacuate into Hogsmeade. Behind them, the younger Gryffindors catcalled their Slytherin counterparts.   
  
“Are we doing the right thing?” muttered Daphne beside him. “Leaving like this?”  
  
“What else can we do?” Blaise asked distantly. One or two minor scuffles erupted between two third years but stopped when Blaise pulled them apart. The Gryffindor looked at his head boy with utter loathing, and it was all Blaise could do not to yell that Slytherins were not all the same, not everyone was a Death Eater, and some, like him and Daphne, were uneasy. They stopped on the threshold of a large room. He had heard Draco talk of the Room of Requirement but had never seen it before.   
  
 _So this is where she went,_  he thought and as he walked in, his eyes flitting to the beds with their Gryffindor hangings. There was a hairclip on one pillow – red and gold; Blaise picked it up and saw to his pleasure that there was a long strand of light brown hair caught in the clasp. His mind careered back to Slughorn’s storeroom where she’d dropped this, and Firenze’s classroom where he’d returned it to her.  _‘If I give in ... she’s won’,_ he remembered her saying. Putting the hairclip in his pocket, he saw Daphne watching him.   
  
“Are you going back for Lavender?” she asked.   
  
“She won’t leave. I know that.” With one hand, he tentatively fingered the scar Alecto had left on his cheek.   
  
“You’re staying to fight,” she stated.   
  
Blaise watched as Pansy scrambled into the tunnel. He took a deep breath. It was so simple, now that Daphne had said the words. “Yes. Once this lot are safe, I’m going back.”  
  
“Do you think they’ll accept us?” Daphne asked.  
  
Blaise put his hands on her shoulders. “This isn’t your fight, Daph.”  
  
“It should be,” she asserted. “Tab, Millicent. How about you? Are you staying?”   
  
The two Slytherin girls were waiting by the tunnel entrance ushering the younger children through. Tabitha smiled wanly, raised her hand, but said nothing as she followed them out. Millicent, however, hesitated.   
  
“I have to get home,” she said at last. “I want to see my mum and dad.”  
  
Blaise turned away. “Just us then, Daph,” he said lightly. A thought struck him. “Did you see Malfoy leave?”  
  
“I think so, but I’m not sure.” Daphne frowned in concentration. “He’ll have gone to join his daddy, won’t he?”  
  
Blaise nodded in agreement. He turned around, noticing Ginny Weasley sitting mutinously beside a worried looking pink-haired woman. She was murmuring a prayer over and over again. “Don’t die, Remus. Don’t die, Remus.” And Blaise realised who she was. Professor Lupin’s wife was as voluble as he was reticent.  _Opposites attract,_ he thought ruefully.  
  
He and Daphne ran against the tide of pupils, heading back to the Great Hall. At the entrance, he noticed groups heading off in different directions, but Lavender was not with any of them.   
  
“I can see Padma,” declared Daphne and she walked away to join a Ravenclaw group.  
  
Around him, Blaise noticed people staring at him, hostility alight in their eyes. He scanned the hall for someone friendly, but what did he expect? They all eyed him with suspicion. Blaise made a decision. He would fight, and not just for  _her,_  but because it was right.  
  
“Professor Lupin,” he called. His former teacher turned and bade his team stop before they entered the grounds.  
  
“Not ‘Professor’ any more, Blaise,” he replied. “You haven’t left with your House, I see.”  
  
“No, sir, I want to fight ... if you’ll have me.”  
  
Remus stared into his eyes then slowly held out his hand; Blaise accepted it. “We’re patrolling the grounds. Don’t take unnecessary risks and don’t leave the group.”  
  
Blaise nodded and looked at the rest of the group. A man with a scarred face and hair so red he could only be a Weasley, held the hand of a woman Blaise recognised as Fleur Delacour. She showed no sign of recognition as Lupin introduced him, but Blaise remembered very clearly the beautiful girl dancing at the Yule Ball.   
  


***

  
  
Lavender stood with Parvati as George Weasley explained which tunnels needed guarding. “We don’t know,” he said, “if they’ll use them, but they know of their existence. The entrances are small, so if anyone comes through we can pick them off easily.” Lavender gulped. George’s hand went automatically to his ear as he continued, “They won’t hesitate to kill you, but if you can’t kill, then a Stunner to the face or one of my sister’s famous Bat-Bogey hexes should stop them.” He grinned. “Come on, guys. I have a bet with Fred that my team will bring down the most Death Eaters. Don’t let me down.”  
  
Out of the corner of her eye, Lavender saw Padma and Daphne running along with Fred.   
  
“Daphne?” she called out.  
  
Daphne didn’t stop running but turned her head and shouted, “Blaise is here, Lavender. We’ve stayed to fight.”  
  
A wave of relief rushed through her. She felt her shoulders lighten and hadn’t realised she’d been so tense. But it was temporary. Blaise could so easily die, and if by some miracle she survived, he’d never know she was pregnant.   
  


***

  
  
In the grounds, they were losing. The Giants had joined the fray and Blaise felt real fear for the first time in his life as the Death Eaters advanced. He looked at Fleur who was fighting hard alongside him and then at Lupin and Bill who were parrying hexes with aplomb. Fleur cried out suddenly as a curse caught her in the stomach. Doubling over, she careered into Blaise, sending him to the ground. Lying down, he was caught by a Stunner to the side that knocked his wand from his hand. Bill took his eye off the Death Eater he was duelling and a red shaft of light missed him by an inch. He watched in horror as Lupin sent a jinx towards Bill Weasleys’ adversary, leaving himself open and defenceless. Blaise scrambled for his wand, but it was too late, far too late, and he watched helplessly as Lupin crumpled to the ground, felled by the Killing Curse. Finally, Blaise hurled a hex at the Death Eater’s eyes that sent him sprawling; his mask ripped away to reveal the cold, merciless face of Anton Dolohov.   
  
Crouching next to Blaise, shielding his wife, Bill Weasley looked at him. “If you can walk, will you take her inside for me?” he entreated. “Keep her safe.”  
  
“I’m not leaving you, Bill,” Fleur growled with determination. “I came ‘ere to fight.”  
  
Bill looked into Blaise’s eyes and a silent understanding passed between them. “Take her, and I’ll cover you,” Bill whispered.   
  
Plucking her from Bill, Blaise stumbled inside with Fleur in his arms. He saw Professor Lupin’s wife running past, screaming for her husband and his stomach plummeted at the knowledge that her worst fears had been realised.   
  
He had to find Lavender.   
  
“Zabini!” Blaise looked across the hall and saw Finnegan running towards him, his wand held high. Gripping his own wand tight, ready to defend himself from the Gryffindor’s attack, Blaise lowered Fleur onto the ground, with some more of the wounded, and faced Finnegan.   
  
“I’m on your side!” he shouted.   
  
Finnegan stopped short and nodded. “I know. Lavender told us and I’ve been fighting alongside Daphne.” He tugged at Blaise’s arm. “I need to speak to you.”  
  
Blaise pulled himself free. “We’re in the middle of a war, here – can’t it wait?”  
  
Finnegan pulled on his arm again and dragged him to the corner. “You have to get Lavender out of here, Zabini. Merlin knows, Parvati and I have tried, but she won’t bloody leave.”  
  
“Gryffindors don’t run,” Blaise replied sarcastically. “Why do you expect her to be any different?” He pulled away again from Finnegan and started to scour the hall, searching for some sign of her.   
  
“She’s pregnant!”  
  
Blaise whiplashed back to Finnegan.  _“What?”_  
  
“Your kid, Blaise.”  
  
The use of his first name by a boy he’d always considered his rival convinced Blaise more than anything else did that Finnegan wasn’t lying.  _A baby,_ he thought in horror.  _Fuck, fuck, fuck. What had they done?_  But he had no time to process this. He had no time to think about the consequences. All he knew was that Lavender was there and most likely thought he’d left her. Instinct kicked in – not for his survival – but the instinct to protect his own.   
  
“And she’s fighting? Oh, dear gods. I ... I ... I have to find her. Seamus, where is she?”  
  
Blaise heard a shriek from the top of the staircase. In shock, he watched the balcony crumble and then he bellowed, for tumbling down to the stone floor was Lavender ... and Fenrir Greyback. He was too far away, could not reach her, but he shouted a curse in white-hot helpless fury that shot far off its mark. Greyback, barely stunned from the fall, raced over to Lavender’s lifeless body, baring his teeth. He lunged, and Blaise, in utter despair, knew she would not survive.   
  
 _It was not he,_  Blaise mused years later, _that had saved Lavender. It was not he, or even Seamus, who’d been her saviour. That role fell to the teacher he’d always derided. Professor Trelawney launched crystal ball after crystal ball into the air and, with a true aim, smashed them into the skull of Greyback to save her favourite pupil._  
  
As Blaise raced across the room, Greyback sank into unconsciousness. He crouched beside her body, but a yell from above alerted him to more danger. Giant spiders were now entering the Entrance hall, scuttling across the floor, intent only on killing and devouring their prey. Standing in front of Lavender, Blaise fired Stunners at them, in a desperate attempt to make them flee. The spiders advanced and Blaise, still shielding Lavender, knew he could not run.   
  
“Fucking hell. Death by a fucking bunch of spiders.” He shook; he’d always hated spiders, convinced they’d kill him. Redoubling his efforts, he shot more jinxes into the pack. He heard Hagrid thunder down the stairs and launch himself at the spiders, and then the pack retreated carrying the groundskeeper off.   
  
The brief respite was all Blaise needed. He crouched down by Lavender.   
  
“You came back,” she murmured weakly, her eyes fluttering open.  
  
Blaise scooped her up in his arms, gathering her close and thinking, inconsequentially, that although she was heavier that Fleur, she was, to him, far more beautiful. He carried her to a side room that Madam Pomfrey had set up as a temporary hospital. Blaise laid Lavender down gently on one of the stretchers. There was a gash running down her neck where Greyback had savaged her.   
  
“What happened, Mr Zabini?” Madam Pomfrey asked briskly when she reached them.   
  
“She fell from the balcony. I think her shoulder and leg are broken ... but Greyback got her.”  
  
“Did he bite her?”  
  
“I don’t know. He was baring his teeth.” He grabbed her arm. “He wasn’t a werewolf though ... she’ll be okay, won’t she?”  
  
Gingerly, Madame Pomfrey unbuttoned Lavender’s shirt. “Not much blood. They’re claw marks, not bites.” She looked into Lavender’s eyes. “There’ll be some scarring, Miss Brown, but you’re lucky – claws leave less contamination than teeth, so they’ll fade in time.”  
  
Cautiously, she ran her hand over Lavender’s shoulder and leg. “Yes, both broken. It won’t take long to mend, though, dear. A simple Charm.” She picked up her wand, and Blaise, looking only at Lavender’s face caught the anxiety there, and saw her hand as it flew protectively to her belly.   
  
Clutching at Madam Pomfrey’s arm, he blurted out, “She’s pregnant. Will your spell hurt the baby?”  
  
He heard Lavender’s indrawn gasp of breath, and carefully smoothed her hair back from her face. “Seamus told me,” he murmured.   
  
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, and winced as she tried to sit up.  
  
Madam Pomfrey stared at the both of them and then squeezed Lavender’s hand. “Let me heal your bones. I’ll be very careful and it won’t harm the baby.” She met Blaise’s eye. “Mr Zabini, this is no place for her. She should leave. I’d suggest the hospital wing, but I can’t guarantee the Death Eaters will respect it as a place of Healing.”  
  
“I know that. I’m taking her away now, as soon as you’ve healed her.” He frowned at Lavender. “Don’t argue with me; you’re leaving.”  
  
He stood up and gazed around him. There was a lull in the fighting now. The Death Eaters had fled when the spiders had arrived, but were probably regrouping in the forest. Then something caught his eye – a small, sudden movement and a flash of very blond hair diving into a side room. Assuring Lavender he’d be back, he left her with Madam Pomfrey and ran towards the door.  
  
“Malfoy!” he called. There was no reply as he opened the door to the dark room. “It’s me, Blaise.”  
  
“Go away.” Draco’s voice sounded raw, as if he’d been crying. Blaise lit his wand and walked towards the huddled figure in the corner of the room. He crouched down, wondering why Draco smelt so strongly of smoke. “I don’t have time for this. I need to get someone out of here.”  
  
“Who? Brown?” Draco asked. “Why bother? She’ll be dead wherever you take her – you too, probably.”   
  
Blaise shook him. “Shut the fuck up! I need your help, Malfoy. Tell me how to get into the Room of Requirement.”  
  
Draco raised his head from his knees and laughed bitterly. “That’s all you want from me. How important is it?”  
  
“Very. Look, Mal- Draco, I have to get her out.” He shook Draco again. “I’ll do anything, give you anything.”  
  
Draco shrugged him off. “You’ve got nothing I want, Zabini. Besides, the room’s fucked now.”  
  
“What?” Blaise gripped Draco harder by the shoulders.   
  
“Burnt down. Fiendfyre,” Draco mumbled. He turned his head to one side, and Blaise saw that although his face was grimy, there were tear tracks running down his cheeks. “Crabbe did it. Wanted to finish Potter, Weasley and the Mudblood off. Stupid arse didn’t know how to stop-” His voice cracked and he began to sob, rocking backwards and forwards. “Stupid, stupid bastard.”  
  
“Crabbe’s here?” Blaise questioned, all thoughts of escape gone.   
  
“Crabbe’s dead, Zabini,” Draco spat. “Now fuck off and leave me alone.”  
  
Blaise paused as he stood up, studying Malfoy. He wanted to shout that crying for Crabbe was wrong, because some people deserved to die, but he knew it was pointless. He turned on his heel and raced back to Lavender.   
  
“Change of plan,” he said smoothly. He looked at Madam Pomfrey. “We can’t leave yet. There’s something wrong with the escape route, so I’m going to take her somewhere else.” He smiled down at Lavender. “How do you fancy a trip to the Slytherin dorms? I reckon we’ll be safest there. No one can get in without the password and I -” He smirked. “As Head Boy, I can change the password.”  
  
“I can fight,” Lavender interrupted with grim determination. “Madam Pomfrey has mended my shoulder and leg. I’m fine.”  
  
Blaise sat down by her side and took her hand. “Greyback attacked you. You’re not only weak from that, but you’re pregnant.” Gathering her to his chest, he kissed her on the top of her head. “You can’t stay here.” She pulled away slightly and looked up at him. “ _Please,_  Lavender. Listen to me.”  
  
“I’m not leaving,” she told him and wrenching away, she pulled herself to standing, a determined look on her face. Then her face blanched, the colour draining away and she doubled over. “Oh God, it hurts. Something hurts. Blaise... help me.”  
  
“It’s the claw marks, Lavender. That’s why you can’t carry on fighting. You have to get away now. I’ll take you. I’ll even come back and fight in place of you ... if that’s what you –” He broke off as Lavender began to gasp in pain. She swayed and fell into him, clutching at her stomach.  
  
“It’s the baby,” declared Madam Pomfrey, as she took hold of Lavender and sat her back on the floor. “She’s miscarrying. This is not the place, Mr Zabini.” She lowered her voice. “See that she’s comfortable. It’s all you can do.”  
  
“Can’t you do something?” Blaise urged, registering the utter desolation in Lavender’s expression, and wondering why he felt so hollow.   
  
Madam Pomfrey placed a hand on Lavender’s abdomen. She shook her head. “The fall was too much. Professor Slughorn has a supply of poppy juice in his storeroom; it will help.” She stood up, and for all her brisk words and manner, Blaise saw her eyes were misty with unshed tears. She sniffed loudly. “Go, now, while you can.”  
  
Carefully, he carried her away, picking a path through the milling crowds as he strode purposefully away from the Great Hall and towards the dungeons.   
  


***

  
  
Blaise heard later that Harry Potter was struck again with a Killing Curse but miraculously survived.   
  
Lavender was told by Parvati that Neville had chopped off a snake’s head with the sword of Godric Gryffindor.  
  
Firenze smiled as he spoke to Blaise saying how the Centaurs had entered the Battle, their arrows raining down on the Death Eaters’ heads.   
  
Hannah was full of awe as she related how Molly Weasley had felled Bellatrix Lestrange with a cold, hard, fury born of protecting her children.  
  
They both heard how Harry had suddenly appeared and how he had slain Lord Voldemort. How Lord Voldemort’s curse had deflected and hit the would-be-slayer, and how Harry had caught a wand as it span towards him.  
  
They both heard of this, but did not see.   
  
In his dormitory, Blaise held Lavender close as their baby, the youngest victim of Lord Voldemort, died inside her. Refusing the poppy juice that would dull the pain, she shrieked at the unfairness of it all, and Blaise tried not to cry for the child he hadn’t known existed and now never would.  
  
And then, as the celebrations continued around them long into the day, he held her and whispered that it would be okay, that he did not blame her, that they would be together because  _fuck it all_  he loved her and that was all that mattered.


	9. Before I Sleep

_This I must say, dilly dilly, and it is true,  
You must love me, dilly dilly, ‘cause I love you._

  
  
Lavender Brown was floating in blue – in azure blue waters of a sparkling sea. As the warm, early summer sun caressed her, she felt herself heal. She smiled dreamily, luxuriating in this bliss.   
  
“Hey, sleepy head,” whispered a voice in the distance. Lavender opened her eyes, and felt a mild lurch of disappointment when she realised she was in her bed at home. Sitting on the side of the bed, however, was Blaise. Slowly, he lowered his lips to her brow. “How are you this morning?”  
  
“Fine.” Aware of his scrutiny she sat up, pulling her pyjama top straight. Indicating a plate he’d placed on her bedside cabinet that was piled high with croissants, jams and butter, she asked, “Is that all for me?”  
  
Blaise grinned at her. “I thought you’d like breakfast in bed and I also decided I’d escape up here to eat.”  
  
She sighed. “Are they arguing again?”  
  
“Mmm, but trying not to when I’m there,” he replied as he opened a jar of blackcurrant jam. Spreading it inside a croissant, he handed it to her. “The months apart must have been hard. Perhaps they need a really big row to clear the air?”  
  
Lavender chewed slowly. “I’m not sure. They never used to argue at all.” She rubbed her eyes with one hand. “Not just the separation. I think it’s more about the Battle.”  
  
Blaise said nothing, but split another croissant in half and then, kicking off his shoes, lay on the bed with her.   
  
“If Mum hadn’t returned that night, then I think things would have been okay,” she muttered.   
  
“She’s like her daughter,” he stated, and gently gave her hand a squeeze. “Couldn’t stay away.”  
  
Lavender closed her eyes, remembering the morning when she’d emerged from the Slytherin Dungeons supported by Blaise. Her mum was searching for her with Parvati, both fearful that she’d been among the dead, despite the reassurances from Madam Pomfrey. Heather Brown had clasped her daughter in her arms, and then pulled away in alarm when Lavender cried out in pain from Greyback’s ravages.   
  
Lavender learned that on hearing the clarion call to war, her mum had Apparated from her foreign hideaway, and landed in the midst of the Battle desperate to play her part, to defend the daughter she knew would stay. But Thaddeus - ever cautious Thaddeus – had dwelled too long at home, waiting for his daughter, sure that she would return and then they’d escape together to join Heather. He’d turned up long after the final duel, too late to fight.  
  
The sound of something smashing in the kitchen brought her back to present day. A shout in anger made her jerk her head, wrenching her shoulder. She cried out in pain as the scars split open, blood seeping through her top. Blaise leapt off the bed and strode to the bathroom, returning with a dampened flannel that he compressed into her shoulder. As the pain eased, she noticed him staring at her. She stared back and he looked away.   
  
“Reminds me of Slughorn’s storeroom when I looked after you,” she murmured lightly.   
  
For a second, she thought he smiled at her, sharing the memory of their first time together, but Blaise’s face was a mask as he continued to dab at her cuts. “This is no good,” he announced at last.   
  
“What?”   
  
Blaise gestured to the door, downstairs and the argument still raging in the kitchen. “You can’t rest here; you’re on tenterhooks the whole time.”  
  
Lavender lay back on the pillow. It was a source of disagreement between them. Blaise wanted to take her to his mother’s; she was too scared to leave, fearing she was the only reason her parents were still together.  
  
As if he read her thoughts, Blaise said grimly, “If they split up, Lavender, it won’t be because of you. The war changed people – you know that. None of us are the same as we were a year ago.”  
  
 _A year ago, I was pining for Ron_ , she thought.  _Six weeks ago, Blaise said he loved me, but now ..._  
  
Blaise took her hand. “Look, I understand that you don’t want to stay at my home. Mum can be pretty intimidating, I know, so -” he paused “-will you come to Italy, instead?”  
  
“I thought you wanted to stay in London. Haven’t you got things to do here?”  
  
“I need to give evidence at the Carrows’ trial, but that’s next week. Let’s go to Italy – today – and then I’ll take the Floo back when I’m needed.” He squeezed her hand again. “You won’t be alone; there’s a servant there, Carissa, and she’ll take care of you.”  
  
“Servant – you mean like a house-elf?” Lavender asked and smothered a laugh as she imagined Hermione’s face if she knew there were house-elves in Italy too.  
  
Blaise shook his head. “Not a house-elf, Carissa is a Korybantes – or rather she’s descended from that race. They’re protectors for families. Apparently she turned up when I was born.” He broke off suddenly and bit into his croissant and Lavender knew he was thinking about the baby she’d lost – that they’d lost - but he said nothing. Instead, he brushed off some crumbs from the quilt and simply said, “Please Lavender, will you at least think about it?”   
  


***

  
  
The sea lapped the shore that led to his house, and as Lavender walked out to the beach, she paused on the wooden steps taking in the sight.   
  
“Miss Lavender, � necessario il cappello,” called a gruff voice behind her.   
  
Lavender looked down to see Carissa, holding out a wide brimmed sunhat for her. Taller than a house-elf, Carissa more closely resembled a human, except for a slightly flattened face, and elongated slanting eyes. Her long, dark brown hair was coiled neatly on top of her head. Although she spoke Italian, Blaise had assured Lavender that she understood English very well. “She’ll look after you,” he’d whispered when he’d left for London. “Make sure you let her.”  
  
“Grazia,” she replied to Carissa, and smiled as the creature withdrew politely. “Carissa, was there any message from Signor Blaise, this morning?”  
  
“Non questa mattina,” Carissa said, shaking her head.   
  
Plonking the hat on her head, Lavender let herself out of the house. Blaise had been away for three days now. He’d sent an owl saying that the trial was overrunning as the committee were taking testimonies from everyone, but Lavender wasn’t quite sure she believed him. Parvati, in a separate owl, had informed her than most people’s testimonies were being given as written statements and that the committee no longer required evidence in person. Why Blaise would lie, she didn’t know, but Lavender suspected that he was relishing the breathing space.   
  
As she walked to the water’s edge, she stripped off her shirt to reveal a purple bikini. Tossing her hat onto the sand, she entered the sea and began to swim. Her shoulder ached, and the salt water stung her injuries, but she’d been told this was the best thing to help her heal, so she persevered every day, trying to concentrate on getting better and not thinking too much about her distance between her and Blaise.   
  
For whilst he hadn’t left her side since the Battle of Hogwarts, and had been attentive and caring to the ‘nth degree, he’d also not slept with her since then. He had said during that awful night when she was miscarrying that he loved her, he’d protect her, and she didn’t think he was lying – not then – but now? There was a sadness about him – about her, too – and it was as suffocating as a Lethifold. For so long she’d seen him as her refuge and escape from oppression, but now she wondered if that were all. Away from Hogwarts, they had nothing to fear; perhaps that would drive them apart.   
  
When her shoulder and back began to ache unbearably, Lavender emerged from the water. Still wet, she delayed putting her shirt back on, but instead removed the letter from its top pocket.   
  
 _Dear Miss Brown,_  she read,  
 _Thank you very much for the letter you sent us. Here at the Daily Prophet, we’re very interested in everyone’s stories from the past year..._  
  
She folded the letter and placed it back in her pocket. She knew what the letter said by heart now, but still hadn’t decided what she should do. _I need to talk to Blaise. I need to know what’s happening before I can make plans._  
  


***

  
  
Blaise was shown into the drawing room of the London residence of Mr and Mrs Flint by a very snooty-looking house-elf. She waited attentively while he removed his wet cloak and gestured for him to sit in one of the overstuffed upholstered armchairs by the hearth. Instead, Blaise stood by a large bookshelf and scrutinised the titles. The books were old and probably valuable, but he doubted anyone in this house had ever opened them. Slowly, he eased out a book he recognised, from years ago, on exotic poisons. He wondered, not for the first time, about his mother.   
  
“Blaise, darling.” Her voice as she stood in the doorway sounded a touch irritable.   
  
“Sorry,” he replied as he walked over to kiss the proffered cheek. Clad in a green silk dressing gown, her heavy perfume clung to her. “I know it’s early but my first Floo connection is at nine-thirty and I wanted to see you before I left.”  
  
After summoning the house-elf and ordering strong coffee for the both of them, Karis sat in one of the armchairs. Blaise sat opposite.  
  
“I don’t understand why you can’t stay longer,” she complained. “I’ve barely seen you, and we have your future to discuss.”  
  
“I don’t want to leave Lavender for too long.”  
  
“How is she?” Karis asked politely.  
  
Blaise sipped his coffee wondering if his mother was really interested. “Bones mended, scars healing – she’s well ...” He stopped. Putting his cup down on the coffee table in front of him, he leant forwards. “She’s not the same.”  
  
“She lost a baby, darling. That’s not surprising.” Karis touched his arm; the contact surprised him.   
  
“I thought you wouldn’t approve. Thought you’d say we were far too young.”  
  
“Old enough to fight in a battle, and old enough to die for a cause,” she replied ironically, and then after giving his arm another squeeze, she settled back in her chair. “The thought of being a grandmother fills me with horror, I’ll admit, but I’m not really in a position to lecture you, am I?”  
  
She adjusted the plush cushion behind her back and sipped again from the delicate china cup. “Perhaps it was a blessing. You’re not under any obligation now. She got herself pregnant and now there’s no baby.”  
  
“I don’t feel obligated!” he exclaimed angrily. “And Lavender didn’t ‘get herself pregnant’. It happened and I was responsible. Any ‘obligation’ is down to me knowing that I should have got her away sooner, should have dragged her away before she started to fight, and should never have slept with her, never have kissed her...” He put his head in his hands.   
  
“Should never have saved her from the Crabbe boy?” Karis ended succinctly.   
  
Blaise looked up in surprise. “How do you know about that?”  
  
She stared at him. “Jonah has a friend at the Ministry who knows about the Crabbe family’s action against Potter. I read the transcript of your evidence, surrounding the boy’s character ... yes, yes, I know they’re confidential, but he saw your name and let me see.” She paused. “Why did you get involved? It would have been easy to keep your head down and she wasn’t your girlfriend then, was she?”  
  
“No, she wasn’t,” Blaise admitted. He met his mother’s gaze. “But I couldn’t do nothing – not again.”  
  
Karis blinked. “What are you talking about?”  
  
“I heard you and Tiberius Crouch in your bedroom every night before he died.”  
  
The image flashed clearly in his mind of the heavyset old man who’d had more stamina than his predecessors, and a violent streak covered by a thin veneer of sophistication. Tiberius had wanted nothing more than to break his much younger wife, but Karis had proved to be a fighter. Blaise remembered hearing through the bedroom walls her desperate cries and then nothing as Tiberius used a Silencing Charm. Shortly after, he too had been silenced -- permanently.   
  
“I didn’t know you knew,” she said in a low, shaking voice. “You can’t have been much older than nine.” Staring at the poisons book Blaise had placed alongside his coffee cup, she traced the title with her fingertips. “There was nothing you could have done.”  
  
Blaise watched as she picked up the book and replaced it in the bookshelves, fingering the spine and then turning away decisively to return to her chair. He sighed. “I know that now, but I couldn’t walk by and let it happen to someone else.”  
  
Karis stared at him. “You are so like your father,” she breathed.  
  
“Which one?” Blaise asked, and his eyes lit up wickedly.   
  
“Josiah, of course,” she replied decisively. “None of the others had an ounce of integrity.” Finishing her drink, she poured herself another cup, and offered more to Blaise. Checking his watch, he shook his head. “Do you love her?”  
  
“Yes,” he replied. “Very much.”  
  
“And does Lavender love you?”  
  
Blaise looked down at his saucer, marvelling at the intricate pattern around the edge. “I think so,” he said at last, “but sometimes she’s distant. I thought that being away from Hogwarts, away from Britain would help, that we could get back to the way we were...” He trailed off, wondering why on earth he was discussing this with his  _mother_  of all people.   
  
“Perhaps that’s your problem,” Karis mused.   
  
Blaise waited for an infuriatingly long time as she sipped her second cup of coffee. “You were saying?”  
  
“Mmm, well, perhaps the problem is that she needs to have a nudge, a reminder of what you mean to each other.” She paused, adding ironically, “There is such a thing as too much space, darling.”  
  
“Oh!” He smiled as he remembered some cushions in a classroom. “Thank you, Mother.”  
  
“I do wish you’d stop calling me ‘mother’. It makes me sound like some dreadful old hag living with a blanket covering my knees. I am only thirty-three.”  
  
“You’re thirty-six,” he reprimanded, smiling at her. He stood up. “I must go if I’m going to make that Floo connection.”  
  
Karis glanced at the clock on the mantelpiece. “You have plenty of time.”  
  
“Nope, I need to make a detour before I leave,” he replied firmly.   
  
“I don’t suppose there’s any chance you’ll change your mind about the Greengrass girl?” Karis asked plaintively. “It would be  _such_  a good match.”  
  
“Stop it.”  
  
“What would you do if I threatened to cut off your allowance?”  
  
“Probably rage at you for a while and then get off my arse and get a job.” He kissed her again, but this time with real warmth. “Bye then, Karis.”  
  
Karis kissed him back. “Goodbye, my darling boy.”  
  


***

  
  
Blaise watched from the terrace as she walked out of the sea in her purple bikini. Thinking she was unobserved, Lavender hadn’t covered up the scars that ran from her neck to her shoulder and then halfway down her back. He shivered when he remembered how close she’d come to death.   
  
It had been an irritating journey. Floo connections across Europe were not good, and the last one had left him covered in dust and choking as Floo powder and ashes pervaded his lungs. Deciding not to Apparate, he’d walked the last two miles home.   
  
For the first time in his life, Blaise Zabini was unsure what to do next. He wanted Lavender back in his bed – not the unmoving girl who slept  _alongside_  him – but the girl he thought about constantly. The witch he’d enjoyed all over Hogwarts – little caring about the consequences. Was it selfish to want that girl back?  
  
His throat felt dry, so he gulped down some water from a pitcher on the table, tipped the rest over his head and then, stripping off his shirt, he walked towards her.   
  
“I’m back,” he called out, rather unnecessarily as she’d already seen him approach.   
  
“Don’t,” he said as she immediately began to pull on her shirt. “Salt water and sunshine. They’re natural healers, Lavender. Don’t cover up.”  
  
“They’re ugly!” she burst out angrily and pulled the shirt tighter across her body. “ _I’m_ ugly.”  
  
Blaise sat on the sand next to her. “The scars are ugly,” he admitted gently, “but you’re not.” He reached out a hand and slowly traced one scar through the flimsy material, from her shoulder up to her neck, finally resting one finger on her cheek. “As Carissa would say, ‘Bellissima!’”  
  
She tried to laugh but it turned into a sob. He held her tight. “What’s wrong?”  
  
“Nothing,” she said and sighed. “What could possibly be wrong in such a perfect place?” Sniffing, she stared out to the horizon. “How did it go in London?”  
  
Realising she was changing the subject, Blaise sighed but played along. “I gave evidence.” He shrugged. “They’ll both be in Azkaban for a long time. No Dementors there now, though. Minister Shacklebolt has dismissed them.” He pondered this, thinking that some prisoners deserved the Dementors, then realised that Lavender was eyeing him suspiciously.  
  
“What are you looking at me like that for?”   
  
She held his gaze, staring fearlessly. “Parvati told me that evidence wasn’t given in person for the Carrows. They took written testimonies instead.  _She_  didn’t even go to London.”  
  
Blaise swallowed and then began tracing a pattern in the sand with his fingertip. “It’s not what you think,” he muttered.  
  
Lavender turned away, but he pulled her back towards him. “What am I thinking?” she asked sulkily.   
  
Cupping her face in his hands, Blaise kissed her gently on the lips. “Vincent Crabbe’s mother has taken out an action against Potter. She blames him for her son’s death. ” He stroked her hair. “I gave evidence against Crabbe’s character and previous actions, but, don’t worry, I didn’t tell them your name.” Dropping a kiss on her brow, he pulled away slightly and looked into her eyes. “Sorry, I should have told you.”  
  
“Yes,” she murmured. “You should have. I can take hearing his name you know. I’m not that fragile.”  
  
Blaise pulled his legs up to his chest and leant forwards resting his chin on his knees. “I gave evidence to the committee reviewing Snape as well,” he muttered, and snorted sarcastically. “They listened very politely, but I might as well not have bothered. Potter’s evidence was far more compelling – mine was just seen window dressing.”  
  
“Stop it, Zabini. You’re starting to wallow in misery.”  
  
“Well, perhaps I’m sick of being cast as the perpetual bad-guy because I’m a Slytherin,” he snapped, and then realised she was grinning. “Brown, you’re a tease.”   
  
She stared at him, and then reached out and stroked his cheek. “Am I?” she asked hesitantly, her blue eyes shimmering.  
  
Blaise stopped breathing and then slowly lowered his lips to hers. “Liquid Amortentia,” he whispered, praying he wasn’t taking this too far. “Ti amo.”  
  
As her lips parted and his tongue began to tease, he heard her moan softly. Lavender ran her hands down his back, slipping her fingers under the waistband of his trousers. Blaise groaned and then pulled back.  
  
“What’s wrong?” she asked fearfully. “Please Blaise, don’t pull away from me.” She clutched at him. “If it’s these scars, or that it’s over between us, then just tell me. I can take it, you know.”  
  
At her words, Blaise felt a surge of pleasure ride through him. “Oh, Merlin,” he soothed as he pulled her back towards him. “It’s not over, it’s not the scars, and it’s not you at all, Lavender.” He laughed suddenly. “It’s this place – the beach – it’s not private.”   
  
“You coward,” she gurgled, as her face lit up with happiness and - he was delighted to see -  _desire_. Her fingers slowly slid down his torso, but Blaise removed her hand, and then laughingly scooped her into his arms, carrying her towards the house.  
  
“I’m discreet,” he reposted and then smirked. “Except in libraries.”  
  
Carrying her up the stairs, he kicked open the bedroom door, and deposited her on the four-poster bed. Leaving the balcony door open, but pulling the filmy muslin curtain across, Blaise slipped under the crisp linen sheets and pulled Lavender into his arms. His hand slipped around her back as he fiddled with the clasp of her bikini. Fumbling awkwardly, he stopped and pulled away. “Why did you think it was over?” he asked, puzzled. “I brought you here, didn’t I? I told you once that this was where I pictured us, don’t you remember?”  
  
Lavender lay her head back on the pillow and slowly traced a line from the faint scar on his cheek and down to his lips. “At Hogwarts you were all over me, but since the Battle ...” She looked away. “I didn’t think you wanted me anymore.”  
  
“Of course I wanted you. I still  _want_  you, Lavender. Shit, I screwed this up, didn’t I?” Blaise leant over her and began twirling a tress of her hair between his fingers. “I was trying to take a leaf out of your bloody Founder’s book. Be  _chivalrous_  to my Gryffindor girl and give you space.”  
  
“I didn’t need space,” she murmured. “I needed this.” Lavender drew his head down to hers, and began to kiss him. Blaise gasped as her lips left his and achingly slowly made their way from his mouth, his neck, his chest, straying further down until ...  
  
“Oh sweet Merlin, Lavender,” he muttered.  
  
“Is this what you pictured?” she whispered softly, teasingly.  
  
But Blaise was incoherent.   
  


***

  
  
Later, when the sun was casting long shadows and a breeze trickled through the muslin curtain, Blaise stirred. He reached for Lavender, and felt a momentary stab of panic when he realised she was gone. On hearing a crash, a muffled curse and a quick  _‘Reparo!’_ emanating from the kitchen, he lay back and smiled.  
  
“Good, you’re awake,” Lavender said as she walked in carrying a white china bowl. He smothered a snort as he saw a telltale crack down the side of it that the Repairing Charm had not quite rendered invisible. Wearing one of his blue cotton shirts that fell halfway to her thighs, she sat on the edge of the bed and placed the bowl out of his reach on the bedside cabinet.   
  
“Close your eyes,” she ordered.   
  
Grinning, Blaise did as he was told. Something brushed against his mouth, not soft enough to be her lips, but firm and sweet. He opened his mouth and bit into the succulent flesh of a strawberry. He laughed, instantly transported back to a classroom where he’d introduced her to Amortentia.   
  
“Where did you get these?”  
  
Sitting astride him, Lavender kissed him lightly on the lips. “I went to the local market for Carissa this morning and they were glaring at me.” She reddened slightly then laughed. “This, Blaise, was going to be my last ditch attempt at seduction. I thought it might remind you of Firenze’s classroom.” She helped herself to a strawberry and fed him another. “I hadn’t realised all it took was a snog in public to get you going.”  
  
As she settled back under the sheets next to him, Blaise reached across to the chair by the bed and pulled his wand out from his discarded clothes. Pointing it at the door, he murmured something under his breath, and the next minute smirked as a small object flew into his outstretched hand. Next, he closed the door and then turned back to Lavender. Her eyes widened in anticipation.   
  
“Great minds,” he whispered, as he undid the lid of a small golden jar, “really do think alike. I bought this back from Honeydukes for you.” He dipped his finger in the iridescent chocolate and held it out to her. Lavender poked out her tongue and he whipped it away. “Although, if I’d realised all it took to get you going, Lady Lavender, was for me to start muttering in Italian, then I wouldn’t have wasted my time in Honeydukes, but returned straight away.”  
  
“Pourable Paradise is never a waste,” said Lavender, giggling. Reaching into the bowl on the cabinet, she selected a strawberry and dipped it into the jar. Leaving a chocolaty trail on his skin, she licked his chest lasciviously and then bit into the strawberry.   
  
“Fragole e cioccolato,” whispered Blaise in her ear.  
  
“Perfect combination,” she replied.  
  


***

  
  
When the strawberries and chocolate had long been finished, Lavender lay back relaxing in a wonderful sunken bath. Her hair fanned out like a mermaids as she washed out the chocolate that had somehow made it into her hair. Watching Blaise as he dried himself, she resisted the urge to smile for things were still not quite right ... she knew that.   
  
“What now?” she asked, sitting up.   
  
“Carissa can cook, if you want, or else we can go out. It’s up to you,” he replied, wrapping a towel around his waist.  
  
“No,” she replied hesitantly. “I mean us, Blaise, and the future.”  
  
“Oh!” Blaise sat on the steps that led up to the bath. “I thought you wanted to be a dressmaker, or something? You won’t even have to sit your N.E.W.T.s in August if you take up that apprenticeship with Madam Malkin.”  
  
The water slopped over the sides of the bath as she emerged, and he could see the oily water drops glistening on her honey-coloured skin.   
  
“I don’t want that now,” she asserted as she wrapped herself in a fluffy, white towel. Not looking him in the eye, she continued, “I had a letter while you were away from  _The Daily Prophet._ ” Blaise raised an eyebrow inquiringly but said nothing. “I wrote to them when I was in St Mungo’s complaining about Rita Skeeter’s account of that year under the Carrows. Honestly, I’m not sure she bothered to speak to anyone. She has Neville secretly dating at least five of us while singlehandedly defeating the Carrows and Snape at every opportunity. Merlin knows what Hannah thinks of it.” She giggled but then frowned. “And she skirted around so much of the serious side of the regime. The detentions, the humiliations and ...” For the first time Lavender looked directly at Blaise. “... she didn’t mention you or Daphne returning to fight.”  
  
“I don’t need recognition,” he muttered. “I came back for you, that’s all.”  
  
Lavender looked sceptical. “Mmm, and that’s why you were fighting alongside Professor Lupin, Zabini.” She sat on the step in front of him. “Anyway, I wanted to set the record straight, so I told them my story and ... they want to run it as a column.”  
  
“All of it!” Blaise exclaimed.”Isn’t some of it a bit ... er ... explicit?”  
  
Lavender punched him on the arm. “No, silly, not all of it! Although, if I toned it down and wrote about a ‘tender kiss shared  _under_ a tree’ and you clasping me to your manly chest, I could always sell it to  _Witches Weekly._ ”   
  
Blaise laughed. Summoning a small towel, he started to dry her hair. “You’d have to change the names, of course. You could be Viola Di Marrone, the beautiful but proud half-blood whose utter recklessness with her aristocratic boyfriend called-”  
  
“Zaire Bellini,” she interrupted, laughing.  
  
“That’s it, her assignations with the ‘brilliant’ and ‘devastatingly handsome’ Zaire Bellini, brought their lives into turmoil.” He bent his head down and kissed her neck.   
  
Lavender pulled away slightly and then turned to face him. “I know their story so far,” she murmured, “but what happens to them in the end?”  
  
Blaise cleared his throat. “Well, Zaire sits his N.E.W.T.s and then, despite his mother’s disapproval, travels for a while in a bid to expand his Potions knowledge.”  
  
“And Viola?” Lavender asked in a hushed voice. “What happens to her?”  
  
Wrapping the towel around her hair, Blaise pulled Lavender onto his lap. “That’s the part of the story I don’t know,” he muttered at last. “Zaire would love Viola to go with him but she might well become  _The Prophet’s_  newest reporter. It would be a great opportunity for her.” He sounded wistful.   
  
“Suppose Viola turned the job down?”   
  
“You can’t do that, Lavender.”  
  
“Suppose Viola doesn’t want to work for a paper that’s spent three years printing lies about her friends.” Lavender smiled at him and began kissing his cheek.   
  
Blaise gently pushed her away. “You could change that. You could write the truth so everyone could read it. You can’t turn this down, Lavender. You might not get another chance.”  
  
“Viola di Marrone was also offered another opportunity, but she hasn’t had the chance to tell Zaire about it.”Lavender grinned at Blaise, relishing the hope that appeared in his eyes. “Luna persuaded me to send an article to her dad and, despite the lack of Nargle attacks, Xenophilius liked it. Apparently, _The Quibbler_  is still doing very well since the war and he’s looking to expand the readership. He’s offered to pay me for anything else I write.” She paused, saving the best news until last. “It’s freelance, Blaise and on anything I want, so I’m not tied to an office. I can send him pieces from anywhere in the world.”  
  
And as she talked, Blaise felt a curious sense of peace wash over him. He could half-see their future – for a year at least – mapped out in front of them. But some things still weren’t clear. He wanted this perfect day to continue, but knew he had to talk to her soon.  
  
A smell from downstairs wafted towards them. Lavender smiled. “Carissa is cooking,” she said. “It smells delicious. I hope I have room after all that chocolate.”  
  
“Spaghetti Puttanesca, I think,” Blaise replied, glad for the change of subject. “That’s ‘Whore’s Spaghetti’ to us. The girls in brothels used to make it. It’s gutsy and full of flavour, especially when Carissa makes it.” He stood up and held out his arm. “We should dress for dinner, Lady Lavender.”  
  


***

  
  
Finding some wine in the rack, Blaise uncorked it and poured two glasses. He lit a candle in the centre of the table and gestured for her to sit opposite him. As Carissa served the food, and then withdrew, he raised his glass. “Salute!” he toasted her.  
  
“Cheers!” She beamed in reply and sipped at the wine tentatively. “This is lovely.”  
  
“You sound surprised,” he murmured. The candlelight cast mysterious shadows about her, picking out the lighter tints in hair that she’d pinned back with a red and gold clip. He stared at it, remembering their first time, and Slughorn’s reaction when he realised just who Blaise had been with. There was never going to be an ideal time to talk, but perhaps now was as good a time as any. He took a deep breath.  
  
“Do you think about the baby?”  
  
Lavender looked stunned at the sudden question but then nodded. She put her fork down and took another sip of wine. Staring at the glass, she took her time before replying. “Not all the time – not anymore – but sometimes, especially when you were away at night, it was overwhelming.” A tear ran down her cheek, which she didn’t brush away. “Silly really, he barely existed.”  
  
“He?” Blaise asked, wondering if it was a slip of the tongue.   
  
“I thought it was a boy,” she explained softly.   
  
Watching another tear glisten in her eyes, and seeing Lavender’s determination not to cry almost broke his heart. He had to do something – anything – to make this right again.   
  
“If you want,” he said slowly. “If it would help, Lavender. We could forget about travelling. I’ll get a job at the Ministry and we could try again ...” He trailed off, not quite sure he could believe he was offering to do this.  
  
She shook her head and raised her eyes to the ceiling. “We can’t replace him,” she replied sadly. “And we’re too young.”  
  
“Not too young to fight in a battle,” he said, echoing his mother’s words.   
  
Lavender thought of Fred Weasley and Colin Creevey and more tears welled in her eyes. “Or to die,” she whispered. She pushed her plate away. “I don’t think I can eat any more. Tell Carissa I’m sorry.”  
  
She stood up to leave, but as she walked past him, Blaise caught her arm. “I would have stuck by you, Lavender. You do know that, don’t you?”  
  
She bit her lip. Blaise stood up and led her to the window seat looking out across the sea. “I  _don’t_  know,” she said. “That’s half the trouble. I had no idea how you’d react because we barely know each other. Then you found out ... oh God ... you found out, and he died.”  
  
“We knew the important things, Lavender, and I wanted both of you out of there, you know that,” he replied, pulling her into his arms, desperate to reassure her. She nestled her head in the crook of his arm and he inhaled the soft scent of her hair. “I’ve thought about his a lot since, and I wouldn’t have run out on you. I had no dad ... and also, too many.” He laughed bitterly. “I don’t wish that on anyone.”  
  
Peeping up at him through her fringe, Lavender lifted her head and kissed him softly on the neck. “You know as well as I do that parents can’t stay together just for their kids.” She pulled away slightly and drew herself level to him. “I think Viola and Zaire should travel for a while, get to know each other properly, and then see what happens.”  
  
“Good idea.” He caressed her cheek with his thumb and then leant forwards to kiss her on the mouth.   
  
“Our food is getting very cold,” he muttered after a while. “Carissa will be angry with me; she’s told me I have to feed you up. She’s very protective of you.” He smirked. “She doesn’t know, of course, about your fondness for chocolate. OW!” Blaise pulled away as Lavender punched him on the arm.  
  
“I didn’t see you holding back this afternoon,” she protested.   
  
Blaise laughed as he stood up and pulled her to her feet. “Come on; let’s take a walk on the beach. We can always reheat the pasta.”  
  
With his arm around her shoulders, he led her to the water’s edge. Lavender slipped off her shoes and paddled her feet in the lapping waves as Blaise sat back on the sand, looking only at her. In the moonlight, her hair gleamed and as she twirled around, tendrils escaped from the clip. They streamed down her back, cascading onto the lavender-coloured wisp of a dress she was wearing. Watching, he felt as if he’d been punched in the gut with longing for her.   
  
“I never asked you,” she called as she approached him.   
  
“Asked me what?” he answered, pulling her down to the sand.   
  
“What you changed the password to when we went to the Slytherin Dungeons that night.”  
  
“Oh, that.” Blaise propped himself up on his side. “Well, it had to be something no one else could guess, so nothing too Slytherin, and nothing too Gryffindor.” He flipped her on the nose. “And then, of course, I didn’t know exactly how much you’d told Parvati about us. I know how you like to gossip, Lavender.” He held up his arms to shield himself from the blow she was aiming at him. When he felt safe, he lowered his arms and kissed her. “There was one thing I knew you wouldn’t tell her. I knew because I’d told you it was a secret and that no one else had any idea it existed. A place that was special to me and hopefully to you.”  
  
“Oh!” Lavender’s eyes widened in comprehension. “Tree house!”  
  
Blaise chuckled. “Yes,” he murmured softly as he pushed her back on the sand. His hand slid up her leg until he encountered the soft flesh of her thigh.  
  
“I thought this wasn’t a private beach,” she said, giggling and then gasping as his fingers slid under her silky pants.  
  
“It’s dark,” he replied as he inched her dress upward. “I’m discreet – not dull. And no one...” He moved his hand up her back and pulled down the zip. “... will hear us...” Peeling off her dress, he cast it aside. “... if you are very,  _very_  quiet.”   
  
Shifting onto his back, Blaise pulled her on top of him. She leant forwards, her hair tumbling down, rippling in the soft summer breeze. “There’s no Madam Pince here, Blaise,” she said, laughing. “No Seamus, or Neville to interrupt. It’s just you and me.”  
  
“And the moonlight,” he muttered. His thoughts became nonsensical as she trailed her hand across his chest, slipping her fingers underneath the buttons of his shirt, and tracing a zigzag pattern downwards with her nails.  
  


***

  
  
Much, much later as they sat on the sand, Lavender wearing Blaise’s shirt, for her dress had disappeared with the waves, Blaise held her tight and whispered, “I love you.”  
  
“Ti amo,” she corrected.  
  
“Ti amo, per sempre,” Blaise amended and chuckled at her puzzled expression. “’Forever’, Lavender. I love you, forever.”  
  


_Lavender's blue, dilly dilly, lavender's green,  
When you are King, dilly dilly, I'll be your queen,  
Who told me so, dilly dilly, how can I know,  
I told myself, dilly dilly, love told me so._


End file.
